


Hold Back The River **old version**

by blairxriles



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Awkward Sexual Situations, Awkwardness, Character Death, Cross-Posted on FanFiction.Net, Drama, Drug Abuse, F/M, Hate to Love, Jealousy, Old Friends, Original Character(s), Romance, Slow Burn, THERE'S JUST A LOT OF ANGST OKAY
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-23
Updated: 2019-01-19
Packaged: 2019-07-01 09:07:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 18
Words: 124,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15770985
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/blairxriles/pseuds/blairxriles
Summary: Modern AU in which Tobirama Senju, along with his brother, are co-founders of Konoha Enterprises. Toka Senju is a criminal attorney. The OC is an attending trauma surgeon. And Madara Uchiha still owns Mangekyo Strip Club. (Set in the same AU as my last story, but definitely don't have to read that one to read this one) Still a slow burn. [Tobirama/OC story]





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Check the notes at the end for some housekeeping stuff regarding things like ages, my knowledge (or lack thereof) of medicine, warnings about certain themes ahead, and such. So read it if you're confused about something. It'll serve as my guidelines for ALL future chapters in case someone has a question.

You would think that after two years of an accelerated university program, four years of med school, five years of a general surgery residency, two years of a trauma fellowship, and three years of being a completely self sufficient attending surgeon, that Naminé Nakano would have learned to be on time by now.

But no. Here she was, running through Hidden Leaf Hospital, trying to make it on time to a meeting—a meeting where she would be officially introduced to the staff.

And at this rate, if she made it at all she would have been shocked.

She ran through the hospital, dodging nurses and apologizing when they glowered at her, and eventually made it to the large conference room where the surgical staff and in house physicians were, along with the Chief of Surgery, Sasuke Sarutobi.

By complete accident, she swung the door wide open, almost hitting several people, and causing just about everyone in the room to give her a dirty look for causing such a disturbance.

“Sorry,” she squeaked, closing the door and standing against the wall since the room was full. But Sasuke saw her nonetheless and laughed softly.

“Perfect timing. Naminé dear, would you come up here?”

Catching her breath, Naminé forced a smile onto her face and wiped her forehead in case she was sweating from her early morning sprint, and took quick steps to the front of the room where Sasuke Sarutobi was smiling at her.

“Moving on,” he started when she got up to him, addressing the room. “As I’m sure many of you know, this is Dr. Naminé Nakano. She’s been temporarily helping out around here while we look for a replacement Head of General and Trauma Surgery. I know several of you have even worked with her.”

Naminé looked around the room. She knew a decent amount of the surgeons by now, some physicians, and a fair few nurses. But no one on the staff was really dying to get to know her. Not that she really blamed them since she was stepping into their territory uninvited after all.

“And today I am happy to announce that she will be staying on full time as our new Head of General and Trauma Surgery,” Sasuke announced.

Naminé was prepared for the blank looks from doctors who weren’t directly affected by this, envious ones from other surgeons who were hoping the position would go to them, and hopeful ones from the young interns who wanted the chance to scrub in on some of her surgeries. What she was not prepared for however, was an annoyed scoff that came from the middle of the room somewhere.

She narrowed her eyes and tried to identify who the sound came from, but there were too many people and she couldn’t. So she looked at Sasuke to see that he was already frowning.

 “And if anyone has a problem with it, they can talk to me,” Sasuke stated, now effectively glaring at the room. “That’ll be all.”

With that, the room slowly began to clear out. Sasuke pulled Naminé aside immediately and looked at her with a steady gaze.

“You sure about this?”

Naminé flashed him a grin, “well I’ve already signed the contract so if not, I’m outta luck.”

Sasuke’s stern expression broke and he was already cracking a smirk, “I’m happy to have you here, and not just because you have an excellent reputation as a renowned trauma surgeon—though that certainly helps!” He chuckled to himself.

“It’s also my great looks and charming sense of humor,” she remarked.

Sasuke held in a soft laugh, probably not wanting the other surgeons to see him possibly being too soft, but he did grin at her, “you do have a great bedside manner. Hopefully you can demonstrate that to some of our interns because honestly—they’re horrible.”

“Is that what you said about me when I was an intern?” She teased.

Sasuke pretended to feign thoughtfulness, “well perhaps.”

Naminé put a hand over her chest in dramatic fashion, pretending to be wounded, “and you call yourself my mentor.”

Sasuke shrugged, “my dear, you left far too long ago for me to have ever become your mentor.”

Naminé rolled her eyes, “nine years is not that long.”

“Was it only nine? Here I thought it was thirty.”

“Sasuke,” Naminé chided. This wasn’t the first time he guilt tripped her for leaving his hospital after her intern year, and she knew it wouldn’t be the last.

“Oh all right,” Sasuke relented.

Naminé gave him a knowing look and then crossed her arms to say, “I gotta go. I have a gallbladder removal in an hour.”

“Oh Naminé,” Sasuke called when she was halfway through the room. She craned her neck to look at him over her shoulder. “Have Kotetsu scrub in with you. I promised him he would see the inside of an OR this week after he ran my errands.”

Naminé shook her head and opened the door, “stop torturing the interns, Sasuke!”

“I’m not, it’s called building character!”

* * *

“I heard you made quite the entrance this morning,” Kurenai Yuhi said as she came over to the nurses’ station. Naminé looked up from her charts and smiled at the dark haired nurse that she had spent the past three weeks working with. The two of them were on pretty similar schedules for the most part, although Naminé tended to work more brutal hours.

“I’m going to be late to my own funeral,” Naminé said, putting a crappy cup of coffee to her lips.

“How does a trauma surgeon get away with being late all the time? Isn’t punctuality supposed to be ingrained into your DNA?”

Naminé feigned thoughtfulness, looking to the side and shrugging, but then she looked back at Kurenai, “you’d think so, but no.”

“How do you get away with it then?”

“I’ve got great hands,” Naminé said, winking at Kurenai and one of the other nurses who giggled into her charts.

Kurenai wasn’t impressed and planted a hand on her hip, “that’s a load of bullshit and you know it.”

Naminé chugged the rest of her coffee and tossed the cup into the trash under the desk and stood up so Kurenai could sit down.

“Yes it is, but that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.”

Kurenai gave Naminé a look, but she sat down and pulled up information on her computer screen. Naminé looked back at her own charts and jotted notes in them, still hanging out at the station. She had an office now, officially, but she didn’t feel like going in there just yet. It was out of the way and Naminé wanted to get to know as many employees as soon as possible since her position was finalized—and she couldn’t very well do that from inside an office, now could she?

“You’re still here?” Kurenai asked.

Naminé looked up, about to give a retort back to the nurse, but she saw that the comment wasn’t directed at her, but rather another doctor, one with dark hair and equally dark eyes, who had come up to the nurses’ station to steal some of the candy they had out.

“When do I ever leave?” The doctor said back.

What the hell was his name? Naminé saw him around enough the past couple weeks, but she never worked directly with him. She knew he had to be a fifth year resident or so, as he could perform surgeries on his own, but for some reason their paths never crossed before.

“Excuse me,” Naminé cut in, walking to the other side of the nurses’ station where the doctor stood.

His dark eyes widened and he took half a step back when she walked right up to him and held her hand out.

“I know I’ve seen you around here but we’ve never actually met. I’m—”

He took her hand before she could finish and offered her a timid smile, “Dr. Naminé Nakano. I know who you are. I think the entire surgical floor does.”

Naminé blinked and pursed her lips, acutely aware of the snickering that was coming from Kurenai.

“Well at least I can make an impression. Wouldn’t you say so, Doctor…” Naminé trailed off, hoping he would fill in the missing piece.

“Uchiha,” he said. “I’m Kagami, one of the residents.”

Naminé nodded, “oh so you mean indentured servant.”

Kagami actually laughed at that for a brief second, “feels like that sometimes.”

“That’s because that’s what residency is,” Naminé said back with a smirk on her face.

“Kagami, don’t let her bully you. She’s bored because she doesn’t have some poor guy being rolled in here after being impaled on a tree,” Kurenai said. She stood up and walked away from her computer, rolling her eyes when a particularly annoying patient was buzzing her to come to their room.

“It doesn’t have to be a tree, you know! A light pole would do too!” Naminé called out to Kurenai, despite her being halfway down the hall. Kurenai waved her hand dismissively and Naminé turned her attention back to Kagami, gesturing at where Kurenai just was, “ _she’s_ the bully here. I’m just an innocent bystander.”

Kagami only crossed his arms and looked at her, trying to hide his amusement.

“Dr. Matsuo wasn’t kidding when she said you were…” He paused and Naminé raised her eyebrows at him. “Very excitable.”

Naminé narrowed her eyes for a fraction of a second, “Dr. Matsuo?”

Kagami nodded, “she's the attending neonatal surgeon.”

Naminé couldn’t help it, her eyes narrowed again, “ _Asami Matsuo_ works here?”

“So you know her?” Kagami asked. “She made it sound like you two only met once or twice.”

Naminé let out a sound that was a cross between a snort and scoff and looked around. So that’s how it was going to be, huh?

“Oh yeah… Yeah, just briefly met once or twice,” Naminé muttered.

“Right,” Kagami said. He cleared his throat and gave Naminé a polite smile. “I gotta get back to work. It was nice meeting you, Dr. Nakano. Hopefully we get to work together in the future.”

Naminé smiled at him and let him go.

So Asami still worked there then. Naminé wondered how she hadn’t seen her at all the last few weeks, but it was probably for the better.

Who knows. Asami might have poisoned her somehow by now if she did.

* * *

“You’re quiet today, Brother,” Tobirama Senju said.

“Am I?” Hashirama asked.

Tobirama’s eyes flickered away from the report he was reading to see Hashirama deep in thought, sitting across from him at the table. His brother’s brow was set and he was staring off into the distance, and Tobirama’s jaw clenched.

“If you tell me you’re thinking about issuing shares to Madara again…”

Hashirama huffed and he came back to reality, “well why not!”

Tobirama’s face settled into a glower. It didn’t matter how many times they went over this. Hashirama would never learn.

“Perhaps because he tried to take part in a hostile takeover of the organization that we worked so hard to build,” Tobirama snapped.

Hashirama frowned, “Madara also helped build it.”

“ _Tch_ ,” Tobirama crossed his arms.

“It's not like he would be a majority shareholder. I say we persuade the board to issue him just a standard amount, that way he’s part of Konoha Enterprises again.”

“Absolutely not,” Tobirama put his foot down.

“Tobirama!” Hashirama was about to argue with him, but was cut off before he could even start by his phone ringing.

He paused and fished it out of his pocket, a smile spreading across his face when he saw the name on his screen, “Mito!”

Tobirama went back to reading over the quarterly report that was just issued by Konoha Enterprises as his brother spoke with his wife. He was accustomed to tuning Hashirama out when he spoke to his wife on the phone. Ever since he found out that she was pregnant he had been doting on her nonstop, and the sappiness made him sick to his stomach.

But when he noticed a sudden shift in his brother’s voice, he looked up from the report again and narrowed his eyes.

“Well you have to go to the hospital then and that’s it… Well I’m sure you are fine but… No. I’ll be there and we’re going to the hospital just to be sure.”

Hashirama hung up his phone and immediately stood up, slipping his jacket on as he did.

“What is it?” Tobirama asked.

“Mito fell,” Hashirama said, a deep frown appearing on his face. “She says she’s fine, but I’m worried and I want to have her looked at, so I’m going to take her to the ER.”

Tobirama paused, but he nodded anyway, getting up to walk his brother to the door.

“Let me know how it goes.”

Hashirama promised he would and then he stepped out.

* * *

“Dr. Nakano, can you lend a hand or are you going to sit there eating candy and doing nothing for the rest of your shift?” One of the nurses, a younger woman named Anko who had more attitude and spirit than anyone else Naminé had ever come across before in her life, demanded.

Naminé stared and her eyes darted around the nurses’ station. She already performed several procedures during the day and now that she had a second to herself, she was doing some charting by the nurses’ station and avoiding her office. Sure, she had taken some candy and kept getting distracted, but she didn’t think she was doing nothing.

“I’m doing something!” Naminé tried.

“Yeah, a whole lot of nothing!” Anko shouted. Naminé frowned and felt her lips begin to form a pout. “The ED is incredibly short staffed and they need all the help they can get. Why don’t you go down there?”

Naminé scoffed, “that’s what interns and residents are for.”

Anko planted her hand on her hip and glowered at Naminé and stared her down like a snake waiting to attack its prey. Naminé shifted under her stare and awkwardly began to pick at the corner of her fingernails.

“I don’t care if you’re some big hot shot trauma surgeon or not. We’re short and there are patients down there who need help and you’re just taking up space over there. If you wanted to sit around all day doing nothing you should have gone into corporate.”

Naminé let out a quick laugh and stood up, grabbing her stuff.

“I can’t believe I’m getting pushed around by a nurse,” but Naminé was still heading for the emergency department, actually a little impressed at the woman’s boldness. Nurses like that were the ones that made hospitals run and she could respect that.

When Naminé got to the ED she saw that ‘short’ was a gross understatement for the state of the emergency room. She whistled and headed over to the nurses’ station to see what assignments she could pick up.

“I have been sent down here to help by a very scary and very bossy nurse upstairs, so give me something to do before I have to go up for surgery,” Naminé said.

The nurse that she spoke to was young, probably just out of college with brown hair and glasses. Her eyes flashed up to Naminé’s face first and then rested on her navy blue scrubs and then on her badge around her neck and actually _squeaked_.

“Dr. Nakano!”

Naminé gave her a smile, “the one and only.”

“I don’t…” She stopped and looked over her shoulder, surveying the waiting area and then craning her neck to look at certain rooms, “I don’t think we have any big traumas here for you.”

Naminé clicked her tongue, “I can examine noncritical patients too. C’mon, you’re short and I’m free. Let me help.”

 The nurse nodded and grabbed a chart and handed it to Naminé, already pointing to one of the rooms that had the door shut.

“Patient in 28C was just admitted. One of the interns was going to get to her but we’re really swamped. She seems to be fine, but it’s good that you’re here because she had a bad fall and she’s pregnant—”

“Got it,” Naminé said, walking to the room before she could even finish what she was saying.

The chart didn’t have much information in it, just the typical demographic information, some medications the patient was on, brief history, and a name.

Naminé knocked on the door, waited a brief second, and then entered the room, closing the door behind her so the ruckus from outside wouldn’t prove to be too stressful for the woman. If she was pregnant and had just taken a fall, then she was probably already pretty badly shaken up. The extra noise of the busy ED was the last thing she needed to worry about.

Sitting on the examination table was a slender woman with deep red hair that was pinned into two buns on her head, and dark eyes. She didn’t appear to have any serious injuries, aside from a bit of a bruise on her head. Her skin looked very pale too, but Naminé couldn’t be sure if that was just her complexion or if because of the fall she supposedly suffered.

“Good afternoon, Miss Uzumaki,” Naminé said, putting on a professional smile as she quick washed her hands in the sink that was against the wall behind her. “I’m Dr. Nakano.”

The woman met her eyes head on and gave her a tight smile, “call me Mito.”

Naminé, careful to keep her expression pleasant since Mito did not seem to want to be there, nodded as her eyes flickered down to the chart.

“I understand that you’re pregnant and had a fall today. Can you tell me about that?” Naminé looked at her again and Mito huffed and rolled her eyes.

“I tripped down the last few stairs at home earlier and hit my head. I’m perfectly fine and I wouldn’t even be here if my husband wasn’t such a worrier,” Mito stated.

Naminé kept that polite smile plastered on her face as she took out her penlight, checking the woman’s eyes to make sure her pupils weren’t blown and that they dilated okay, which they did.

“Well he wants to make sure that wife and baby are okay,” Naminé said, putting her penlight away. “Sounds like a keeper to me.”

Mito snorted, “he is, but he worries enough for the three of us, baby included.”

Naminé chuckled, “I’m gonna have you lie back for me.”

Mito obliged and Naminé examined her abdomen, gently pressing down along different parts of her stomach. She noticed Mito’s eyes shifting around the ceiling along with the way her folded hands clenched tightly.

She was more nervous than she let on.

“And where’s your husband now? Waiting room?” Naminé asked casually, frowning when she noticed Mito tensing a bit when she pressed down in one area.

“Parking the car. I’m sure he’ll burst in here any minute,” Mito said. She clenched her hands again when Naminé pressed down a second time.

“A little sore here?”

“A bit,” Mito admitted.

“Okay, I’m gonna have you sit up,” Naminé said, helping Mito up, even though she doubted she needed it.

Naminé quick grabbed her chart and made a note in there, and then she was gluing that professional smile on again and taking her stethoscope off from around her neck.

“Well he’ll have to barrel past some pretty stubborn nurses if he wants to do that,” Naminé said, careful to keep her tone light.

Mito chuckled again and Naminé smiled to herself, glad that her patient was starting to relax, even if it was just a bit.

“Then you very clearly haven’t met my husband if you think that’ll stop him.”

“Take a couple breaths for me,” Naminé instructed. Mito did as told, and Naminé listened to her heart, lungs, and abdomen. Everything seemed to be okay.

“Good,” Naminé made another note in the chart and then leaned against the sink and folded her hands and rested them in front of her.

“So how far along are y—”

The door swung open and a man with long brown hair bounded into the room, followed by a nurse shouting at him to get out and to wait in the waiting area with everyone else, but it was too late, because he was already at his wife’s side in an instant.

“It’s okay,” Mito assured, and Naminé could hear an angry nurse huffing and stomping off as the door clicked shut.

“Dr. Nakano, this is my husband, Hashirama.”

Naminé’s eyes widened and she could feel the color drain from her face instantaneously.

He looked just as surprised as she did, as the grin fell off his face and he blinked at her as if she wasn’t really there.

The only thing she could hear was her heart thumping away in her ears, louder than any stethoscope could have possibly made it. And her mouth was suddenly so dry that she swore the inside of her throat would crack, along with the rest of her resolve. She could feel a sweat break out on her palms and forehead, and dear God, did the hospital not have the air condition on or something?

“Is everything okay?” Mito asked.

“Naminé, is that really you?” Hashirama asked.

Naminé didn’t say anything, she just tried to swallow but couldn’t because her throat was so dry.

“You cut your hair!” Hashirama continued when her silence stretched on. When he seemed to realize that she was in fact standing there and that she was in fact real, his whole face lit up, and before Naminé could utter out any words at all, or _run away_ for that matter, Hashirama was pulling her into a backbreaking hug, his joyful laughter filling her ears as he did.

Snapping out of her trance like state, she reluctantly brought one arm up and patted him on the back like an overgrown puppy dog.

“Wow, it’s been… Some time,” were the only words Naminé could articulate.

“Am I missing something?” Mito asked, sounding confused.

Hashirama pulled back and grinned ear to ear at her, “Mito, this is Naminé! She’s one of my oldest friends. She grew up with me and my brothers…”

Naminé tuned him out when he mentioned his brothers and leaned against the sink to look up at the ceiling when a dizziness washed over her.

“Are you okay, Dr. Nakano?” Mito asked, cutting off her husband’s senseless babbling about childhood stories.

Naminé inhaled sharply and looked back at Mito. She was a trauma surgeon and a damn good one at that. She had seen people brought in with missing limbs, impaled by all types of objects, mangled from different tragic accidents, and none of them shook her as much as Hashirama Senju did right now. Not even seeing Hiruzen Sarutobi a few weeks ago hit her as hard as this did.

“Fine. Just a little surprised is all,” Naminé answered. She reached deep within herself for that professionalism, and wrapped it around herself like a cloak to shield herself. She looked back at Mito’s chart, more to compose herself than to actually read it, and then looked back at the couple, focusing on Mito and Mito only.

“Mito, I’d like to do an ultrasound just to make sure the baby is okay.”

“Oh… Okay,” Mito said.

“Would the baby _not_ be okay?” Hashirama inquired.

Naminé swallowed back the lump in her throat when she looked at him, “it’s just standard procedure. If you’ll excuse me for just a moment.”

Naminé ducked out of the room, ready to move across the goddamn country and change her name if it meant she’d never have to see another Senju so long as she was alive. She sucked in a breath and braced herself against the wall. Maybe signing that contract wasn’t such a good idea after all…

“Naminé wait,” it was Hashirama’s voice and Naminé closed her eyes and counted to five before she faced him.

“Yes?”

“I had no idea you were back in the area,” Hashirama said.

“Yep, that was the point. I didn’t tell anyone,” Naminé said quickly, her eyes darting around for another doctor. With how busy the ED was you’d think that more doctors would be walking around, or at least some of the interns, but no. She was on her own here.

“Well we simply have to get together and catch up then!” Hashirama grinned at her, and he was doing that thing he did where he was so excited that he left no room for any arguments or for anyone to turn him down.

“Mm,” Naminé said. “You know; I am super busy. I’m the head trauma surgeon around here so I work around the clock, but it’s really nice you would offer.”

Hashirama let out a booming laugh and swung an arm around her shoulder, “oh you’re not getting out of this that easily.”

Naminé squeezed her eyes shut so tight that they watered, hoping that by some miracle she would open them and Hashirama would be gone.

It didn’t work.

He was still there, grinning like an idiot at her.

That was when she saw Kagami Uchiha at the nurses’ station and wiggled out of Hashirama’s hold.

“Dr. Uchiha!” She called out.

She watched as Kagami looked up and saw her waving him over. She caught the way he and a nurse exchanged a nervous glance, but he came over regardless of how much he might not have wanted to.

Being an attending had its perks.

“What can I do for you, Dr. Nakano?”

 _‘You can get this big lug far, far away from me’_ is what she wanted to say.

“Hashirama, I’m so sorry but I have to go. Dr. Uchiha asked me if I would help him with a consultation and I promised I would, and it’s actually pretty urgent.”

“Did I?” Kagami asked. Naminé shot him a look with what her friends called her ‘crazy eyes’ and stared him down until he corrected himself. “Oh… Oh right. Right, I did.”

Hashirama’s eyebrows furrowed, “what about Mito?”

“Don’t you worry. Dr. Uchiha will conduct the ultrasound and finish examining her. He is an excellent doctor,” she said, resting her hand on Kagami’s back and nodding reassuringly.

“Uh,” Kagami muttered.

“I’m sure he’s a great doctor, but I would feel so much more comfortable if you were her doctor, Nami.”

Great. Wonderful. Now he was using old childhood nicknames. Fantastic. What could go wrong with this?

“Well—”

Naminé’s attention was pulled away from the stubborn Senju in front of her to see a bloodied man on a gurney being wheeled straight to the elevator, being handled by two interns and a third year resident who was performing chest compressions on him.

And right on cue, her pager went off and Naminé fished it out of her pocket and took one look at it and let out a sigh of relief.

“I’m sorry, Hashirama. I just got paged and I’ve got to be in surgery. Dr. Uchiha will take care of you. Right, Kagami?”

Kagami gaped at her with wide dark eyes, but he saw both the man on the gurney who she was being paged to go operate on, and a pregnant woman’s worried husband in front of him, and he let out a sigh and took Mito’s chart from her.

“Right,” he grumbled.

“Naminé,” Hashirama tried to get her attention as she took impossibly quick steps to the elevator to follow the interns up to the OR. She refused to turn around and already began scraping her short blonde hair back into a ponytail when she heard him call her name again.

It was really simple avoiding him after that.

She just pretended not to hear him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Housekeeping below:
> 
> Ages/Relationships: since this story is set in the same AU as my last story, and since I wrote myself into a bit of a wall regarding certain characters' ages, they're not following the cannon. So for example, Hiruzen Sarutobi makes an appearance, but he's written older (the way he appears in the anime/manga), while at the same time Hashirama and Tobirama are younger, so for the purpose of this AU, Hiruzen is older than them. I'm GENERALLY showing characters as the ages they appeared in the anime/manga. And also, due to the same reasoning above, relationships among characters might be different (example being Sasuke Sarutobi will be Hiruzen's cousin instead of father because of the whole age thing). I know it's screwy, all I ask is you bear with me. I'll try to weave in clarifiers for this throughout the story if two characters show up and their ages/relationships conflict with what they should be in the canon.
> 
> Medical knowledge: I spent my undergrad in accounting and taxation and I'm continuing on for a masters in taxation right now. I think it's safe to say my medical knowledge is lacking. While I do have friends in med school, two critical care nurses in my family, and a cousin doing a residency in internal medicine right now, I am NOT a doctor. I'll try to be as accurate as possible in my portrayal of medical events, but they're going to purposely be kept vague. HOWEVER. If you know something is wrong and it is just GLARING you in the face and pulling you out of the story, drop a comment and I will be HAPPY to fix it!!
> 
> Themes: There will be darker themes in this story as opposed to my last one. While I do plan on a happy ending, themes of depression, mental health issues, substance abuse, and anxiety will absolutely be appearing. So let this serve as your trigger warning. Those things are not the focal point of the story, but they're definitely there, sometimes stronger in certain chapters than others.
> 
> General: While this story is NOT a sequel to my last one, it IS a little bit of a continuation, as I'm using the same AU and there are things that happened in that last story that might appear (it'll be super brief) in this one. Definitely did NOT have to read that one to read this, but I'm just throwing that out there... This story might be a little ambitious for me because of the themes, but I've had it in my head for the better part of a year and a half now. So be kind in the comments when dropping constructive criticism. I also write as a hobby, so while I'm putting myself on a schedule for this story (so it doesn't drag on forever like my last), sometimes I'll miss updates. I'm human. All I ask is that you understand(:
> 
> That's enough of that.
> 
> I hope you enjoyed the introduction of this new story! Hopefully you'll stick around for the rest to see how it all plays out!


	2. Chapter 2

Naminé held her breath, watching the monitor in the OR that flat lined. She had done all she could to try and revive the sixteen-year-old girl on her operating table, but if the girl couldn’t come back from it, then there was nothing more Naminé could do to save her.

She gave a great sigh and pulled her bloodied hands back, “time of death: 7:48.”

Naminé pulled back and immediately went to rip her gloves and mask off, not wasting any time in scrubbing her hands so she could get out of there.

“You okay?” Kagami Uchiha asked, coming up to stand beside her at the sink and scrubbing his own hands. He had been the resident in there with her as she tried to save the girl’s life from a car crash, but despite their best efforts, they couldn’t do it.

“Yeah,” Naminé answered, feeling her eyes glazing over. “This one just hits a little too close to home.”

“Can’t save them all. She was already almost dead by the time we opened her up,” Kagami said under his breath.

“No, we can’t,” Naminé’s eyes flickered back to reality and she looked over her shoulder at Kagami. Feeling her gaze on him, he turned to look back at her. “And now I get to go out there and talk to her mother, a woman who probably isn’t even grey yet, and let her know that she has to bury her baby. She’ll never get to go to college, she’ll never get to get married, she’ll never get to have children, all while the man who hit her is in the ICU getting the best care we have to offer.”

Kagami didn’t say anything, but his dark eyes gradually shifted back to the sink where he was slowly washing his hands.

“It gets old, Dr. Uchiha. It gets very old,” Naminé said. She turned the sink off and grabbed a towel to dry her hands off.

Kagami looked at her again, “why’d you pick trauma then?”

Naminé gave him a bitter smile, “because I must be a masochist.”

He didn’t say anything to that and Naminé slipped out of the OR, bracing herself for the moment she hated most.

Naminé pulled the girl’s parents aside into one of the small conference rooms reserved for these situations, and told them that their daughter passed away on the table, and that they did everything they could to save her. They took it the way most parents did, with some tears and shouting at the impossibility of it all. Naminé tried to pacify them as best she could, but there came a point where she did all she could, and when the couple had to just hold each other while they grappled with an unimaginable loss.

She headed back to her office, her hand going to her head and yanking off her scrub cap to stuff it into her pocket. Maybe there she could get some paperwork done to distract her from her recent failure.

Naminé closed the door behind her and sat down at her desk, seething through her teeth when a stinging sensation shot through the middle of her back. She squeezed her eyes shut, clenching her jaw through the discomfort and pushed her head against the back of her desk chair. She breathed through the pain, waiting for it to dull to a minor tingle before she was able to open her eyes and focus on the paperwork at hand.

With the soreness temporarily gone, she logged onto her computer and stared blankly at the reports she had to go over.

It was impossible to focus though because all she could hear in the back of her head was that stupid monitor flat lining.

Naminé sighed and leaned her elbows on her desk and rubbed her temples with her eyes shut, and that’s when another blinding white hot sting of pain stabbed her back again, making her actually yelp as her hand shot to her back.

Her eyes opened and she saw stars and felt sweat bead on her forehead, and not knowing what else to do to soothe her pain, she yanked open the drawer of her desk so hard that it came off the tracks. Naminé clenched her jaw so tight that she half worried she would chip a tooth, but she still leaned over to rummage through the drawer for the pill bottle that she knew was somewhere in there.

And thankfully she found it quickly, gripping it and fumbling with the cap until she finally got it off, and poured a few pills into her palm and put them to her mouth, swallowing them dry.

She winced as she felt them go down, but breathed a little deeper in relief, tossing the near empty pill bottle back into the drawer, not even bothering to put it back on its tracks for the time being.

_Knock knock knock_

Naminé straightened up and leaned down, jamming the drawer into the desk over and over again until it finally got back on its tracks.

“Come in!” Naminé called.

Sasuke Sarutobi walked in, his hands in the pockets of his white coat.

“I’ve been trying to get to you all day,” he said, sitting down in one of the chairs in her office. Naminé relaxed and leaned back, grinding her teeth at the pain in her back.

“I’ve been in and out of the OR since I got here,” she said.

“I know,” Chief Sarutobi remarked. “You’ve had a couple of fatalities today.”

Naminé actually cringed, “please don’t remind me.”

“Nature of our profession unfortunately,” Chief Sarutobi leaned back and interlaced his fingers across his stomach. “When you were an intern you had a back made of Velcro when it came to losing patients.”

Naminé didn’t need to be reminded, “I haven’t changed much as an attending.”

He frowned, “well you should. You’ll never make Chief of Surgery if you don’t.”

She rolled her eyes, “did you want something? Or did you just stop by to lecture me?”

“A bit of both,” he cracked a smile at her. “It’s actually about a certain someone you ran into the other day in the ED. Perhaps you’ll know who I’m talking about. Long hair, big mouth, can’t take no for an answer, easily excited. Ring any bells?”

Naminé actually let out a groan, purposely banging her head on the back of her chair as she pinched the bridge of her nose, “don’t tell me Hashirama called you.”

“He didn’t,” Chief Sarutobi confirmed, but he still smirked at her. “He called Hiruzen.”

“Who then called you,” Naminé finished for him.

“That would be correct,” Chief Sarutobi said. “I know you saw Hiruzen not too long ago after that incident with the CEO of Konoha Enterprises.”

“I did, and judging from the reaction from Hashirama, he didn’t say anything to him—which I am eternally grateful for.”

Chief Sarutobi shrugged, “well regardless, Hiruzen called me to let you know that he gave your contact information to Hashirama and asks that you give him a phone call because he would like to have you over for dinner tomorrow night.”

Naminé could feel her expression twisting into one of horror, “ _what?_ ”

“It was either agree to that, or risk Hashirama being as stubborn as an ox and coming to the hospital and waiting around for you. Hiruzen said Hashirama was bound and determined to talk to you because apparently you were a bit evasive when you saw him,” Chief Sarutobi’s eyebrows raised expectantly and Naminé shifted in her seat and pursed her lips into a firm line.

“I was evasive because I didn’t, and still don’t, want to see him,” she stated.

“Funny, here I thought it was the younger brother you didn’t want to see.”

Naminé’s stomach knotted into a tight knot, “Sasuke, don’t.”

Chief Sarutobi held his hands up in defense, “I don’t blame you. But you know how Hashirama can be, and it might be in your best interest to clear the air. You didn’t leave on the best terms.” Chief Sarutobi’s face pulled into a grimace. He didn’t approve of the way she left. No one did. Not even Naminé herself.

Naminé ran her fingers through her short hair, ready to pull it out.

“Or I could just avoid any person with the name Senju for the rest of my life,” she suggested.

Chief Sarutobi gave her a long sigh, “can’t run away from this one, my dear.”

“I can try,” she said back with a shrug.

“Actually, you can’t. You’re locked into a five-year contract with me,” a smirk snuck its way onto Chief Sarutobi’s face.

Naminé pouted her lips, “if you’ve ever loved me you won’t make me go.”

Chief Sarutobi stood up and laughed, a warm sound that normally would have lifted Naminé’s glum spirits, but under these circumstances, only fell on deaf ears.

“I do love you and so does Hiruzen. And that’s exactly why you’ll pick up the phone and call Hashirama and agree to have dinner with him and his wife.”

Naminé could feel the corner of her lips tug downward, “can’t do that if I’m in surgery.”

Chief Sarutobi pulled out a slip of paper from his pocket and left it on her desk, heading to the door, “well it’s a good thing that I’m giving you tomorrow off then.”

Naminé’s mouth actually fell open a bit as she gaped at the elderly man in disbelief.

“ _What?_ ” She demanded.

“Count your blessings. You were supposed to be on call tomorrow night,” Chief Sarutobi smiled at her, “call Hashirama.”

Then he left her office, letting the door shut behind him.

Her eyes lingered on the spot where he just stood, and then she was shifting her attention to the piece of paper on her desk that had Hashirama’s name and phone number on it.

She seriously considered not calling him at all, but she knew that he would have been sure to tell Hiruzen about it, who would then relay the information back to Sasuke, and then Sasuke would get on her case and not leave her alone until she made things right.

So Naminé begrudgingly picked up the piece of paper, and dialed Hashirama’s number.

* * *

Hashirama stared at his brother after their meeting with the board of directors. He pestered Tobirama nonstop to get sushi with him after the meeting, as Tobirama had a tendency to forget to eat because he got so distracted with work. But the real reason he was so determined to get his brother out was because he figured it would be his best chance at getting his undivided attention to tell him about the other day.

He was polite enough when he saw him in the morning, asking how Mito was. Hashirama told him that she was fine and just bumped her head, but he had to leave it at that because of the meeting.

But he couldn’t _not_ tell Tobirama the full story.

Hashirama was just as shocked as Naminé probably was. He really did _not_ expect to see her of all people whatsoever. When Naminé left that day nine years ago, he figured she was never going to come back. She changed her phone number and just like that, _poof!_ She dropped off the face of the planet.

So he had to tell Tobirama that she came back after all this time.

The problem though was with _how_ he was going to do that.

“The most interesting thing happened the other day,” Hashirama started, trying to be sly about the whole thing all while trying to fight back the smile from coming onto his face.

But Tobirama caught on without missing a beat, his red eyes flashing up to meet his in an instant.

“What?”

“I saw an old friend at the hospital,” Hashirama said.

Tobirama seemed to lose interest at that, as he was crossing his arms and leaning far back into his chair, watching him with uninterested eyes. That generally was his reaction to anything that wasn’t work related.

“Do you mean Asami?” He asked, putting a glass of water to his lips.

Hashirama actually had forgotten that Asami Matsuo worked at the hospital because they didn’t see her very often. Asami may have qualified as an old friend, but running into her would have hardly been interesting or surprising. She recently saw them all when Hashirama hosted party to announce that he and Mito were expecting.

“No,” Hashirama waited until his brother put his drink down, because he really didn’t need Tobirama choking to death. “I saw Naminé Nakano.”

If Hashirama didn’t know his brother so well, he would have thought his brother didn’t even know who the woman was, but he definitely noticed the way Tobirama’s eyes widened, ever so slightly, along with the way his hands were suddenly very, very still.

“Excuse me?”

Okay maybe doing this in a public place wasn’t a good idea, because if someone so much as gave them a funny look, Tobirama was bound to blow a gasket and start a fight.

“Well she’s working there now and apparently she’s this really great trauma surgeon. Not surprising though. She was always an adrenaline junkie,” Hashirama said with a smile, hoping to diffuse the tension.

Tobirama then composed himself and his eyes closed as he drank his water, but Hashirama noticed the visible lines of tension in his younger brother's neck.

“Mm,” was the only response that came from him.

Hashirama shifted awkwardly in his seat. This could be going better, but at the same time he supposed it could be going worse.

“You should go see her!” Hashirama suggested with a grin.

The look his brother gave him was murderous, and Hashirama was immediately wiping the grin off his face and clearing his throat and averting his gaze. Yeah… Definitely could be going better.

“Why would I do that?” Tobirama asked lowly.

“Well, just so you two aren’t on bad terms or anything,” Hashirama suggested.

Tobirama did not look any more pacified and Hashirama scratched the back of his head. There wasn’t going to be a good end to this.

“We’re not on any terms,” Tobirama said. “And I have no desire to see her and I am certain the feeling is mutual.”

Hashirama winced. He was expecting that. He really was. But that didn’t mean he had to like it.

“Well you don’t know that,” Hashirama tried.

“I do, Brother. I actually do,” Tobirama told him in a clipped tone that told Hashirama that the discussion was over.

So much for that.

On to Plan B…

* * *

When Naminé finally left the hospital, it was really late, a little passed midnight. And even though there were street lights all over the parking lot, the hair on the back of her neck still stood up when she walked to her car alone. She didn’t think it was something she would ever get over either. When she worked at her last hospital, she always befriended those who worked the same hours as her to avoid going out to her car alone. But she didn’t know the staff all that well at Hidden Leaf Hospital, so she was on her own tonight. Like usual since moving back.

Her heart pounded in her chest as she got closer to her car, her hand clenching so hard around her car key that her knuckles turned white.

But then it was over, and she was getting into her car and locking the doors the minute she was safely inside.

She sucked in a deep breath and put her shaking hands on the steering wheel when she started it up. Her eyes flashed to her rearview mirror and jumped when she thought there was someone standing behind her car, but at the realization it was really just a light pole, she let out a shaking breath and rubbed her temples.

“Get a hold of yourself, Naminé,” she hissed to herself.

She pulled up to her condo about twenty minutes later, pulling in the driveway and grabbing her workbag, about to get out of the car when her hand rested on the door handle and her eyes caught something moving around the corner of the building.

Her heart pounded so loud she could hear it in her ears.

“Stop it. It’s probably a stray cat,” she said under her breath.

But she didn’t get out of her car right away. Her still eyes were glued to that corner, waiting to see something move again, but nothing ever did.

Before she could lose her nerve, she swung her car door open and slammed it shut, all but running up to the front door and trying to unlock the deadbolt and doorknob, but it was proving infinitely harder than she thought because her hands wouldn’t stop shaking.

Then she swore on her mother’s grave that she heard footsteps, and Naminé sucked in a breath, whipping her head over her shoulder, expecting something to be there.

But her driveway was empty, along with the rest of the street.

She turned back to her door and finally got it unlocked, and barreled inside, slamming it shut by ramming her entire body against it the moment she was inside, only moving away to lock the deadbolt, the doorknob, and sliding the door chain back into place.

She struggled to catch her breath, taking a moment to close her eyes and rest her forehead against the door.

When she got control of her breathing and nerves, she staggered upstairs to bed without stopping to grab something to eat, and changed into a t-shirt that was three times too large for her and climbed into her bed, shutting the light off.

She was exhausted. With her profession, that was common enough in itself. But the emotional exhaustion was more draining than the physical, and she really just wanted to sleep until next year. So she let her eyelids flutter shut, sleep already eager to claim her.

But just as she was about to fall asleep, the house creaked.

And Naminé shot straight up in bed and turned the lights on, her heart beating way too fast for its own good.

“ _Shit_ ,” she whimpered, rubbing her forehead.

What was wrong with her?

So she got out of bed and went into her bathroom, rummaging through her medicine cabinet until she found the right pill bottle, and dumped a few capsules into her hand and took them, turning on the faucet and drinking straight from it to knock them back.

Then she went to bed and had a hazy dream of a pitch black street in another city with a figure in the alley.

* * *

Tobirama rubbed his shoulder as he walked up to Hashirama’s front door. He really had to stop sleeping on his stomach because he was waking up every day with sore shoulders, and it was really starting to become a nuisance.

Hashirama called him in the morning and asked if he could stop over in the evening, something about picking up some papers for work. And Tobirama didn’t have any plans, so he didn’t mind going over. Honestly, he spent enough time at his brother’s house that he didn’t think anything of it.

But he should have known Hashirama better than that, because Tobirama opened the front door without knocking and immediately frowned when he heard multiple voices coming from the living room.

“Brother?” Tobirama asked, following the sound of laughter. He half expected his brother to have Madara over, only inviting Tobirama over in some attempt to make the two of them reconcile so he could justify issuing the man some shares of Konoha Enterprises’ stock.

However, the truth was worse. Much worse.

Tobirama entered the living room, his eyes going straight to the reason his brother invited him over.

He was going to kill Hashirama, because there _she_ was, plain as day, sitting next to Mito on the couch with a glass of wine in her hand, smiling until her eyes flashed in his direction and any joy on her face vanished.

The first thing he noticed was that her blonde hair was shorter from the last time he saw her, it barely even touching her shoulders when it once went to her chest. Then he noticed that the circles under her eyes were darker, that she was somehow thinner, and he couldn’t help but take immediate note of just how exhausted she looked.

But then again, his memory of her couldn’t completely be trusted, since the last time he saw her she was in a wedding dress…

Tobirama honestly considered turning around and leaving without saying a single word. In fact, he was about to, but Hashirama probably knew he was going to do that because he was up in an instant, swinging an arm around Tobirama to keep him in place.

“Well, isn’t this a coincidence?” Hashirama asked with a nervous laugh.

Tobirama couldn’t help it. His eyes flickered back to Naminé without his permission, and she looked just as thrown off as he felt, her honey topaz eyes wide like a deer in the headlights and her hands clenching around her wine glass.

“Hashirama,” Tobirama growled, looking away from the blonde woman to instead direct his anger at his elder brother instead.

“Naminé, I hope it’s okay that my brother is here. You know that he forgets to feed himself when he works,” Hashirama said, flashing a broad smile at where Naminé looked like she was about to pop a blood vessel.

“Excuse me?” Tobirama asked lowly. Hashirama ignored him though, like he usually did when it came to Hashirama doing things that Tobirama did not approve of.

Naminé cleared her throat, and Tobirama was looking at her again. “It’s fine, Hashirama,” she said.

No. No it really wasn’t fine.

“I’m not staying,” Tobirama stated. He shrugged Hashirama off of him and crossed his arms, glaring absolute daggers at his elder brother.

“I’ll be upset if you don’t stay because I cooked enough for everyone,” Mito cut in, giving Tobirama a sly smile that told him she was in on his brother’s stupid plan.

He heaved a great sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose.

“Is that a problem, Tobirama?” Naminé’s voice pierced through him.

He took his hand away from his face and met Naminé’s gaze as his face settled into a scowl. She had some nerve looking at him like that and casually putting him on the spot. But she didn’t fool him though, because he knew her well enough to notice all the nervous ticks, such as her picking at the corner of her fingernails when she looked at him. She had nerve, but not enough to fool him.

“ _Ookay_ ,” Hashirama planted his hand on Tobirama’s back and began to push him toward the kitchen. “Let’s not kill each other before dinner,” he said with a nervous laugh.

“I doubt he could manage it, but he’s welcome to try,” Naminé remarked.

Tobirama could feel the exact moment his blood boiled, and Hashirama probably did too, because he pushed him quicker out of the living room before he could say anything to that insufferable woman.

As soon as they were out of the kitchen, Tobirama pulled back and hit his brother as hard as he could upside his head.

“ _Ouch!_ ” Hashirama complained, rubbing his head with a frown.

“What the hell is this all about?” Tobirama demanded.

“I just thought it would be good for you two to reconcile so there’s no bad blood!” Hashirama argued. Tobirama rolled his eyes and scoffed, but Hashirama continued. “And she’s just as evasive as you are and this was the only way I knew how to get you two in a room together.”

“Did you ever consider that I wouldn’t want to be in the same room with the woman who walked out on me the _day_ we were supposed to get married?” Tobirama hissed, about to put his head through the wall if it meant he would be free of his brother’s stupid schemes.

Hashirama frowned and waved his hand dismissively, “that was nine years ago. You don’t know why she did that.”

“Because she very clearly did not want to marry me,” Tobirama deadpanned with one of his nastier glares, beyond frustrated with his brother at this point.

“We both know there’s more to the story than that,” Hashirama stated. “Naminé has always been rough around the edges, but never cruel.”

Tobirama really did consider putting his head through the wall now, because now that Hashirama had his mind made up there was no point in arguing with him. Once he decided something he didn’t yield. Madara Uchiha was proof enough of that.

“Is everything okay?” Mito came in, wearing an all knowing smirk. Tobirama rolled his eyes.

“You knew he was going to do this,” he said to his sister-in-law.

She shrugged her shoulders, “maybe.”

Tobirama was too old for this shit. He wasn’t a child. He was a grown man who did not need his brother meddling in places where he wasn’t welcome.

“Go sit down, I’ll have dinner out in a moment,” Mito said, shooing Tobirama out of the kitchen. He wanted to argue with her, but Mito could be just as bad as Hashirama when she made up her mind. So he gritted his teeth and walked over to the table, pausing when Naminé walked over with her own arms crossed.

“For what it’s worth, I didn’t know he was going to do this. I was just trying to get him off my back for a little,” she said.

He held in a sigh, “it’s fine. I don’t care.”

He didn’t miss the way she rolled her eyes quickly, “of course you don’t.”

Tobirama looked away, trying to temper is irritation.

Naminé didn’t say anything else, but she hovered by the table, looking away from him. He ended up doing the same.

Why did she have to come back? Why? Why couldn’t she have stayed away? What the hell kind of game was she playing?

Hashirama came out, wearing a sheepish grin when Tobirama gave him a blank look and slowly crossed his arms over his chest. Hashirama cleared his throat and turned away from him, ushering Naminé to sit down beside him.

Tobirama begrudgingly sat down across from Naminé, glaring down at the table, even after Mito brought dinner out and as his brother and wife talked to her during the meal. Tobirama only counted down the minutes until he could leave.

“So Naminé, what brought you back to the area?” Mito asked.

“Oh, I just really wanted to move, and the Chief of Surgery at Hidden Leaf Hospital had an opening for a position and called me up,” Naminé answered. Tobirama looked at her for a brief moment, narrowing his eyes.

“That’s your reason?” He deadpanned.

Naminé’s eyes flashed to his in an instant, “is that not good enough for you, Tobirama?”

He held her gaze and Tobirama could hear his brother suck in a breath and hold it, “well you were in such a hurry to leave. I assumed you would have a better reason for coming back to a place you clearly wanted to get away from.”

Naminé didn’t say anything to him at first, but those distinctive eyes of hers were boring into him. Tobirama didn’t allow himself to be phased though. He leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms, watching her with an unamused expression as she gave him that smoldering glare of hers.

“I don’t have to justify my decisions to you,” she said.

Tobirama scoffed and finally looked away from her as he shook his head.

“Uh,” Hashirama cut in, eager to remove some of the tension from the room. “So you said that you were a trauma surgeon now?”

Naminé’s attention shifted away from Tobirama and to his brother instead.

“Yes,” she said, and Tobirama could hear the tightness in her voice. “Tobirama, you’ll be interested to know that that’s another reason why I came back. Hidden Leaf Hospital is a level one trauma center, the only one in the area, and someone with my skills shouldn’t be anywhere else.”

He resisted the urge to roll his eyes and only muttered a ‘hm’ when he lifted his glass to his lips and took a long drink of water.

“What’s that like?” Mito asked, leaning forward and offering an encouraging smile.

“It’s rewarding but exhausting. I tend to work close to seventy plus hours a week.”

“That can’t be good for your back,” Hashirama remarked. Tobirama’s eyes shifted over to his brother. It was a decent point. One that he might have brought up if he wasn’t so goddamn pissed off at her.

“Oh it’s fine,” Naminé deflected easily with a smile that disarmed Hashirama’s concern.

“What’s wrong with your back?” Mito asked, her eyebrows knitting together.

There was a stretch of silence, one where Tobirama and Hashirama exchanged glances, neither of them wanting to look at the blonde woman who sat across from him.

“When I was twenty-one I was in a bad car accident—broke my back in three places,” Naminé answered with a light tone.

Mito seethed through her teeth with sympathetic pain, “I’m sorry to hear that.”

Naminé shrugged, “long time ago.”

Tobirama risked a look at her, and found that she was picking at her fingernails again.

It was quiet after that as they all finished their meals, and once everyone was done, Tobirama pushed himself away from the table and took all the dirty dishes, despite Mito’s protests about her being able to do it, and walked into the kitchen to clean everything up, followed by Hashirama.

“That wasn’t so bad, was it?” Hashirama asked, looking at Tobirama for some type of approval.

“I’m not happy with you,” Tobirama said.

Hashirama huffed, “it is not that serious!”

Tobirama reeled on him in an instant, “inviting my ex-fiancée over for dinner without telling me and then tricking me into coming over _is_ serious, Hashirama.”

Hashirama frowned, “I just want you two to make amends.”

“Why do you care if we make amends?”

Hashirama’s frown slowly morphed into a glare, “because she’s one of the few people left who still remembers Kawarama and Itama. She’s one of us whether you like it or not.”

It was silent for a long moment, but Tobirama sighed in defeat. Fine. Hashirama had a point. But he wouldn’t admit that out loud. Instead, he just opted to give Hashirama a reluctant nod of his head to silently acknowledge the point.

Hashirama grinned at him, “good.”

The two of them walked back into the living room and Tobirama was ready to leave, but saw that Naminé had her stuff with her and was standing up, thanking Mito for having her over for dinner. She then looked over her shoulder and gave Hashirama a small smile.

“Thank you, Hashirama. But I really should get home,” she said.

Hashirama frowned a little bit, “oh all right. I’m glad you could stop by. Let’s do it again soon.”

Naminé nodded, and Tobirama picked up on the way her eyes went to the window and how her fingers tightened around the strap of her bag.

“Uh, do you think you could you walk me out?” She asked Hashirama, her neck strained.

Hashirama blinked at her. He clearly hadn’t been expecting that, as he was looking at Tobirama with his eyebrows knitting together in confusion. Tobirama held in a sigh, hearing Hashirama’s words about their brothers in the back of his head.

“I’ll walk you out. I’m leaving anyway,” Tobirama said, crossing his arms again. He didn’t miss the way Hashirama’s entire face lit up or the grin that took over his brother’s entire expression.

He expected Naminé to glare at him and tell him to shove off, the way she might have done nine years ago when they were in the middle of an argument, but she didn’t. She just pursed her lips, looked out the window again, and breathed out a very quiet, barely audible, “thank you.”

Tobirama said goodbye to his brother and his sister-in-law, and walked out the front door with Naminé.

“So,” she tried.

Tobirama’s jaw clenched, but he didn’t say anything. He was only walking her out to the street so Hashirama would be happy. Anytime he did something stupid like this, it was always to appease his brother. Naminé was no different.

“Right. Silent treatment,” she mumbled when he was quiet. “Should have expected that.”

She didn’t say anything after that and he was grateful. But when they approached her car, a squirrel darted past them and Naminé actually _screamed_.

“Christ, Woman!” Tobirama hissed, turning a wide eye to the blonde woman beside him.

Her eyes were closed and even in the darkness, he could see her chest rapidly rising and falling in succession with her hand pressed to her mouth.

What the hell was that about?

“I’m sorry,” she said quickly. “I’m sorry,” she said again, pausing to pick up her bag that she dropped when she screamed.

He frowned and kept a steady eye on her, waiting for some type of explanation, but it never came.

“Thanks for walking me out,” she said hurriedly, taking quick steps to the other side of her car and jumping into the driver’s seat, slamming the door shut and driving away the minute she started her car up.

Tobirama stood there in confusion as she drove away. He didn’t know what the hell that was about. Naminé was never one to startle easily, not even when they were kids, because even back then she had nerves of steel.

He shook his head and turned on his heel to go back to Hashirama’s driveway where his own car was parked, but stopped when he stepped on something.

Tobirama looked down and moved his foot, crouching down to get a better look.

It was too dark to be able to tell what it was right away, but he already identified it when he saw black fabric with white roses.

It was Naminé’s scrub cap.

He picked it up, the material soft to the touch, clearly from being worn down over the years. It was the very same one he gave to her when she was about to graduate medical school and matched into the surgical program that she wanted.

Why the hell did she still have it?

He rubbed the back of his head.

That was interesting…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Drop a comment and lemme know your thoughts my dudes


	3. Chapter 3

Naminé tore through her workbag, her work locker, tore through anything she could get her hands on.

_Where was it?_

She threw everything in her locker onto the floor, dumped her workbag out, letting out a nasty string of curses each and every time she came up empty handed. There was no way she lost it. No way. It lived in her workbag when she wasn’t wearing it.

So where the hell was it?

“Whoa, what are you doing?”

It was Kurenai’s voice and Naminé didn’t even look at her, too hell bent on ripping through all of her personal items.

“I can’t find it,” Naminé muttered, more to herself than to Kurenai.

“Can’t find what?” Kurenai asked.

“ _My scrub cap!_ ” Naminé shrieked, kicking her spare clothes in a blind rage and collapsing onto the bench. She buried her face in her hands and struggled to compose herself.

“What is it with you surgeons and your scrub caps? Just use one the disposable ones,” Kurenai said, opening her locker as she started to change into her scrubs.

Naminé shook her head and stood up, snatching her clothes off the floor and shoving them into her locker. She shoved her workbag in there too and slammed her locker shut as hard as she possibly could, earning another concerned look from Kurenai.

“You don’t understand,” Naminé groaned, putting her hand to her forehead, trying to recall where she could have misplaced it. It definitely wasn’t in her office, but maybe it was in her car? Maybe it fell out of her workbag on the way to the hospital?

“I get it, Nakano. It’s lucky. Every surgeon swears their scrub cap is lucky,” Kurenai said easily.

Naminé squeezed her eyes shut and lightly banged her head on her locker a few times. Sure, she had other scrub caps for when she washed her usual one, but it wasn’t the same. She needed that one, the beat to all hell one with white roses from a time when things were simpler. Even if she didn’t wear it at all, she needed to have it in her pocket, or at the very least know where it was.

“I’m going out to check my car,” Naminé said. She saw Kurenai roll her eyes, but she didn’t say anything, and Naminé was thankful. She knew Kurenai wouldn’t understand, and honestly, Naminé wasn’t going to explain it to her.

She took quick strides, hoping to not be paged before she checked her car.

It was midmorning, so the sun was out and there was still a chill in the air from the shifting seasons, and Naminé didn’t have her sweater on, so she shivered when she walked outside in just her scrubs and white coat.

She unlocked her car and pulled open the door of the driver’s side, kneeling on the seat to dig around for where her scrub cap might have fallen out of her bag after hitting a pothole or something of the sort.

But there wasn’t anything under her seats or on the floor of the passenger’s side or the driver’s side or even the back seat of her car. The only things in her car were countless disposable coffee cups and that was it.

No scrub caps.

Naminé’s head dropped between her shoulders and sighed hard enough to make her whole body shudder. So much for that.

_Where the hell was it?_

She got out, and shut the door, feeling disheartened at her lack of results.

That was when she noticed a piece of paper underneath one of her windshield wipers.

Naminé raised an eyebrow and couldn’t help it when her eyes shifted around the parking lot, looking for a cop or someone who must have given her a ticket. She wasn’t parked anywhere she wasn’t supposed to be parked, her car’s registration wasn’t expired, and she didn’t think she sped at all on her way to work? And even if she had, she could have always pulled the ‘I’m a trauma surgeon I had to go in for surgery’ card to avoid a ticket.

But when she picked up the piece of paper, her stomach dropped.

** Drop the charges—or I’ll do it again **

Naminé stared at the words written on the paper, abruptly taking in shallow breaths that bordered on hyperventilating.

Her hands trembled so violently she could have dropped the piece of paper, but her fingers were gripping it so tightly that that would have been impossible. She then swallowed hard enough to hear the sound of it, and turned the piece of paper over.

She was going to be sick.

On the back there was a photograph… A photograph of her walking to the front door of her condo one night.

She sucked in a breath that was so shaky and so unsteady that if she was patient in the hospital, she would have immediately pulled them aside to administer oxygen.

Her eyes flashed around the parking lot again, but it was relatively empty save for the cars and the occasional nurse pulling in. She looked back down at the photograph, and recognized her outfit from the other night when she swore she saw something around the corner of her home.

Every instinct told her to rip up the photograph with the threat on it, but she knew better than to do that, so she folded it up and shoved it into the pocket of her white coat, all while she practically ran back into the safety of the hospital.

Her hands were still quivering and she couldn’t have that, not when she had surgery in less than an hour. So she made a beeline for her office, still bordering on a run, and barreled into the room and slammed the door shut behind her.

She went right to her desk, falling to her knees and pulling open her desk drawer and rooting around for the bottle of pills she knew she had in there.

Once she had the bottle, she dumped the remaining pills out into her palm and popped them in her mouth with only an old water bottle to wash them down. The pill canister was empty now, and she hated to think about what that meant, so she didn’t. She just sat on the floor of her office and took out that horrible photograph and dropped it in the drawer and forcefully kicked it shut.

She hugged her knees to her chest and held her head, taking in deep, slow breaths.

It was fine. Everything would be fine.

But then she was thinking about the photograph and the threat that went along with it, and wanted to just curl up in a ball and die.

He knew where she worked. He knew where she lived. He knew what kind of car she drove.

Naminé sucked in a breath that got caught in her throat when a hysteric sob tried to rip its way out of her, but she stopped it before it could, and tugged on her hair.

The case wasn’t going fast enough.

He needed to be locked up already.

She blamed her headspace from the terror and desperation of it all for her next course of action, but in that moment, sitting on the floor of her office and nearly hyperventilating, Naminé didn’t care.

Pulling her cell phone out and dialing a number, she put it to her ear and chewed on the corner of her fingernails.

It only rang twice before someone answered.

“Naminé! I didn’t think I would hear back from you so soon!”

For once, Naminé couldn’t have been happier to hear the sound of Hashirama’s cheerful voice. It actually put her at ease, because her hands trembled considerably less at the comforting and familiar sound.

“Hey,” she flinched at how hoarse her voice was. “Do you have a second? I wanted to ask you something.”

“What do you need?” Hashirama asked. There was no suspicion in his voice and she closed her eyes to force herself to ease up.

“I was wondering if you knew any good attorneys. I figured you had to since you’re the founder of the largest corporation in the country. You’ve got to know some really sleazy, really nasty, really solid attorneys, right? The meaner the better in this case,” she said, tapping her fingers on her knees that were still pulled to her chest.

She was acutely aware of the moment’s hesitation on Hashirama’s side before he responded to her, “…is everything okay?”

It took all of her willpower not to sigh into her phone.

“Everything’s fine,” she told him, knowing full well that her voice was way too tight to be even remotely convincing.

“What kind of attorney are we talking? Corporate? Family? Criminal?” Hashirama asked.

“Criminal,” Naminé answered way too fast for her own good.

“Uh,” Hashirama paused, and Naminé could hear the skepticism now creeping into his usually sunny voice. “I don’t know any criminal attorneys.”

Naminé’s heart sank and she put her hand to her forehead, feeling a headache coming on.

“But Tobirama might,” he said after a moment of silence.

Naminé bit down on her tongue, trying to rub away her headache as the corner of her lips tugged downwards. Even hearing his name hurt.

“I assumed he wasn’t practicing anymore,” she said under her breath.

“He’s not,” Hashirama answered. “But he still oversees most of the legal matter even though he’s not the CEO of the company anymore, so he’s well connected. Plus, I’m sure he knows some scary criminal attorney lurking around his old firm.”

She really didn’t want to drag Tobirama into this… She didn’t want to drag _anyone_ into this shit show, but Tobirama was particularly off-limits. After what she did to him nine years ago, she didn’t want to show her face around him ever again. Having dinner at Hashirama’s and sitting across from him had been painful enough. But this? Going to him for help in this situation?

No way. There had to be another solution.

“Your silence is reassuring,” Hashirama remarked. Naminé might have smiled in another time or another life, but this time she kept quiet. “If you want the best, you and I both know that he’s the one you should be talking to. Not me.” Hashirama’s voice was softer, more brotherly, and that made it so much harder.

“I don’t think he’ll want to help me and I wouldn’t blame him,” she said under her breath.

“Probably not,” Hashirama said with a chuckle. “But I can smooth the waters a little if you want?”

“No, that’s okay,” Naminé said.

She could just imagine the pout that would be on Hashirama’s face when he spoke again, “Naminé, if you’re in trouble he’ll help. You know that, right?”

She did and that’s exactly why she didn’t want to go to him.

“It’s not for me. It’s for a friend,” She tried, cringing at her horrible excuse. Did that excuse ever work on anyone on the planet? She didn’t think so. Not even Hashirama, gullible, naïve, Hashirama fell for it.

“Right,” he mumbled. “I’ll send you his number just in case you change your mind.”

She went to protest, but her phone was already ringing in her ear at the sound of a text coming through from Hashirama. Naminé rolled her eyes and made a mental note to delete that text as soon as possible. She didn’t need the temptation.

Now that she was a bit calmer and thinking a bit clearer, Naminé remembered the reason she went out to her car in the first place, to search for her scrub cap. And since it wasn’t in her car or in her office, she couldn’t help but wonder if her scrub cap maybe fell out of her bag when she was at Hashirama’s?

“Hey, on a side note. You didn’t happen to see my scrub cap at your place, did you? I can’t find it and it must have fallen out of my bag at some point between yesterday and today.”

“What does it look like?” Hashirama asked.

“It’s black with white roses. I’m kinda freaking out about it actually. You know I don’t like to be superstitious, but I feel like I can’t operate without it,” she admitted, feeling anxious all over again.

“Haven’t seen it,” Hashirama said and Naminé couldn’t avoid the disappointment that washed over her.

“Okay. Thanks,” she said, even though she was more than a little disheartened that Hashirama didn’t have either her scrub cap or an attorney in mind.

“No problem. I’m just glad you thought to reach out,” she could hear the smile in Hashirama’s voice and Naminé closed her eyes again, a warmth blooming through her chest from the nostalgia of it all.

“Yeah,” she said before her voice could crack. Then and then she hung up the phone before he could say anything else.

She still sat on the floor, still picking at her fingernails. She supposed her current attorney was fine, despite how slow he was going forward with the case. Honestly, at this point it should have been over and done with by now. But when she initially hired him, she was in such a state that she didn’t care who her attorney was, just someone who would put _him_ in jail…

Naminé would have killed for an attorney who wasn’t in another city or one who was just horrible and ruthless. She didn’t care what she’d have to pay. They could have her entire year’s salary if that’s what it took.

So when she looked back at her phone and saw Tobirama’s phone number, she gave it some serious thought.

If there was anyone who would have known the right person, it would have been him. And if he was still practicing, she might have humored the idea of going straight to him despite him being a corporate attorney.

But Naminé knew better.

Better to leave Tobirama out of it and better to just avoid him all together.

After what she did she didn’t have any right to talk to him or even think about him for that matter, no matter how much she might have wanted to.

But still… What if…

Then her pager went off and Naminé let out a heavy sigh. She wasn’t in the best mental state to operate right then, and she still wanted to know where the hell her scrub cap was. But she didn’t have time to sit there and contemplate her train wreck of a life.

So she got up off the floor and went to the OR.

* * *

“Tobirama!” It was Hashirama, walking into the conference room at Konoha Enterprises that the two of them were temporarily using as an office space for the time being, assisting the company with some changes that were going on internally.

“Yes, Brother?” Tobirama asked. He didn’t even look away from his computer, reading over an email.

“Have you checked your phone at all today?” Hashirama sat down directly across from him, and Tobirama looked at his brother with his eyes narrowed. Why did he look so happy? Nothing good ever happened when Hashirama looked so happy.

“No,” he stated.

“Well maybe you should!” Hashirama said with a grin.

Tobirama regarded his brother with suspicion, but then he was fishing his phone out of his pocket and pressing the home button.

Nothing.

“Is there supposed to be something here?” He asked with a sigh.

Hashirama’s mouth fell open and he gaped at Tobirama’s unamused expression.

“No texts? No phone calls?” Hashirama pressed.

Tobirama’s patience was wearing thin, “no.”

“I thought for sure Naminé would have reached out to you,” Hashirama muttered. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. She is really stubborn, but she sounded so upset that I really thought she would have at least texted you.” He seemed to be talking more to himself rather than to Tobirama, but Tobirama was already frowning at hearing his words.

There were so many things wrongs with Hashirama’s words and so many questions. First, why the hell would Naminé try to get in contact with him? Second, why the hell did Hashirama (because who the hell else would) give his number to that insufferable woman? Third, what had _Naminé_ of all people so upset that she would have reached out to _him_?

“Are you going to explain?” Tobirama asked lowly with a cross of his arms.

Hashirama sighed in dramatic fashion and leaned back in his seat, “she called me earlier today and asked if I knew any attorneys—criminal attorneys. And she sounded really upset, like she couldn’t breathe or something. I don’t know any criminal attorneys so I told her that you were her best option, but it would appear I have forgotten how stubborn she could be.”

“Why would she need a criminal attorney?” Tobirama asked, his face scrunched up in confusion.

Hashirama shook his head, “I don’t know but she sounded _scared_ , Tobirama.”

For once, Hashirama wasn’t smiling at him and Tobirama didn’t know how to feel about that. There was a part of him, a younger and slightly softer part of him that was immediately concerned, but then there was the other part of him, the part that was still bitter and still held a grudge, that told him not to give a shit. But even so… That look on Hashirama’s face still put him off.

“Well she hasn’t said anything to me,” he said, hoping to leave it at that.

“I understand. But if she does reach out to you, promise me that you’ll help her.”

Tobirama’s eyes flashed to his brother’s. Sometimes it was easy to forget that Hashirama could be intimidating because he was so easy going, but with the way he was looking at Tobirama right now, he knew he had to take him seriously.

“Brother,” Tobirama started with an exasperated huff. But Hashirama was now glaring at him, so all right then. Point taken. “Fine. I’ll help her _if_ she asks.”

He really needed to develop a backbone when it came to his elder brother.

“That’s all I ask,” Hashirama smiled at him then. He got up to leave but then paused and looked at Tobirama again. “Oh, she also asked if I found her scrub cap anywhere. You didn’t happen to see it when you walked her out, did you? Black with white roses? She said she can’t operate without it.”

Tobirama blinked.

That was… Odd…

He cleared his throat, “actually, I did. She dropped her stuff on the way out to her car and it must have fallen out.”

Hashirama stared at him, eyebrows knitting together, “you didn’t just leave it there, did you?”

“No,” Tobirama answered, a little too fast. “It’s in my car.”

A smirk was sneaking onto his brother’s features and Tobirama was already rolling his eyes before Hashirama even said anything.

“You kept it?” He asked, not bothering to hide his smirk now.

Tobirama scoffed, “I meant to give it to you but I was tired and went home.”

“Why would you give it to me?” Hashirama was still giving him that unbearable smirk of his.

Tobirama could feel his lip starting to curl in annoyance, “because I knew what it was and I assumed she’d want it back.”

Hashirama seemed temporarily pacified, but that didn’t last long, as his eyes were lighting up again. “Well you obviously need to go give it to her! She said it herself that she can’t operate without it!”

He had a hard time believing that Naminé would honestly become superstitious over something as simple as an article of clothing used to keep her hair back when she was in the operating room. He had an even harder time believing that the object of this superstition was the original scrub cap he gave her all those years ago.

“I’ll give it to you so you can drop it off,” Tobirama said, looking away from his brother and looking back at his email.

“Oh no,” Hashirama said, and Tobirama could just _hear_ how giddy his brother was. “You give it to her.”

Tobirama tapped his fingers on the table, still ardently avoiding looking at his brother’s stupid grinning face.

“I don’t have the time to drive to the hospital to give her a cap. If you want to do that feel free but don’t expect—”

He had intended to rant and call Hashirama out on his bullshit and put him on the spot for trying to meddle in these things, but said rant was cut off by his phone lighting up and ringing with a notification for a text message.

With his rant cut off, he simply glared at his phone that displayed a number he didn’t have saved and looked back at his computer.

It was silent and he could see Hashirama through his peripherals just staring at his phone and then staring him down.

“Aren’t you going to open that text?” Hashirama asked with wide eyes.

Tobirama huffed, “if I open it will you leave me alone?”

“Yes!” Hashirama said with a grin.

Shaking his head, trying his hardest to hold back from yelling at Hashirama, he picked up his phone and unlocked it to see two text messages.

**_‘It’s Naminé. Do you know any good criminal attorneys? The nastier the better’_ **

**_‘So someone like you’_ **

Tobirama's eye twitched. She asked him for help and then gave him shit immediately after? How did that make any sense at all? Why would you insult the person you wanted help from?

The worst part was that it was such a typical Naminé thing to do that he literally felt a headache coming on from how pissed off he was getting.

“I know only one person other than myself and Madara who can get a reaction like that out of you,” Hashirama said, actually snickering into his hand.

“You expect me to help this woman when she blatantly insults me to my face?” Tobirama asked as his eyes flickered to Hashirama’s.

Hashirama shrugged, “it’s her defense mechanism. And at least she’s doing it to your face and not behind your back.”

He didn’t plan on responding to her, but with Hashirama standing there, waiting expectantly for him to respond, he didn’t really have a choice.

Tobirama didn’t like texting in the first place, so he made it a point to give Hashirama his coldest stare as soon as he typed out a response and hit send.

**_‘I’ll look into it.’_ **

“Happy?” Tobirama asked.

“Very! Make sure you tell her I said hi when you drop off her scrub cap,” Hashirama said, already slipping out of the door before Tobirama could pick a fight with him, and then his phone went off a second time.

He absolutely hated his brother sometimes.

**_‘Thanks. They don’t have to be your level of unpleasantness though. You’d never find anyone’_ **

Tobirama actually considered throwing his phone across the room. This was what he got for letting Hashirama talk him into being nice and helping her out. He couldn’t reason with Naminé. He never could. For someone who valued science and logic above all else, she certainly could be irrational as all hell.

Even as children she was like that, teasing him and setting him off simply because she was one of the few people who could.

Then his phone went off again and he wanted to bang his head against the table.

**_‘Hey did you happen to see my scrub cap at all? I think I dropped it last night’_ **

Again, typical Naminé. Piss him off and then act like she didn’t do anything wrong.

**_‘Yes.’_ **

He left it at that, because one way or another he would get Hashirama to take it to her. He was already irritated beyond belief that his brother actually thought giving her— _his ex fiancée_ — his phone number was perfectly fine. So he would force Hashirama to make it up to him somehow.

His phone went off and he gritted his teeth.

**_‘Ok?? Can you, oh idk, bring it to me??’_ **

He could just hear how pissed off she was in the back of his head, and he actually felt a little better. She wasn’t the only one who could get a reaction out of someone.

He was in the middle of typing out a response when his phone rang, and the same number popped up on the screen. He sighed and reluctantly answered it.

“Hello?”

“Seriously? Do you like get off on being so difficult?” Naminé immediately ripped into him and Tobirama had to fight way too hard to keep his anger in check.

“I’m busy,” he said in a stern voice, the same one he often used on his brother. It didn’t do much to deter her though, because she was already ripping into him yet again.

“Obviously not too busy to text me back—and don’t pull that shit with me, you’re talking to a _surgeon_. I know busy,” she snapped. He gritted his teeth and clenched his hand into a fist so he didn’t snap. “Can you _please_ just bring me my scrub cap?”

“I’m working late,” he told her. It wasn’t a lie. He was working late, but not as late as he made it sound.

“Join the club,” she snarled. “I just want my scrub cap, all right? Drop it off and you’ll never have to see me again.”

There were so many things he wanted to say to that. Such as mentioning that it wasn’t his fault she dropped it, mentioning that it was silly for her to be so attached to something so trivial, asking her why she kept that particularly scrub cap after all this time anyway, and even going so far as to point out that her words lacked any meaning since they were never supposed to see each other again after she left nine years ago.

But saying any of those things would have resulted in her blowing up to the next level and honestly, he just didn’t have the patience to deal with her shit. But he was still pissed off, so maybe his response could have been better worded, but he still said it anyway…

“If it means never seeing you again I’ll drop it off right now,” he hissed.

He didn’t miss the long pause on her end of the phone.

“…Bring me the name of an attorney along with the scrub cap and you’ll be free of me forever.”

He glared, “fine.”

“Fine!” She snapped back at him. And for the briefest moment, he felt the urge to smile, but then as quick as it came it was gone again.

“There’s a café on the ground floor of the hospital. Let me know when you’re there and I’ll come down to pick it up,” she added under her breath.

He didn’t have a chance to say anything back because she already hung up on him.

* * *

Naminé angrily worked on her charting at the nurses’ station, still thoroughly pissed the hell off from earlier. She didn’t even greet Kurenai when she walked over, or Kagami for that matter. She just angrily scribbled away.

“Jesus, who pissed in your cheerios?” Kurenai remarked, sitting down and looking up at Naminé.

“Nobody important,” she hissed.

“Do you want some M&M’s to cheer you up?” Kurenai asked, holding up a bowl filled with little packages of candy.

Naminé looked up from her charting to glower at the bowl of candy, but still took the M&M’s regardless and ripped them open, still frowning like a child.

“Better?” Kurenai asked, smirking at Naminé.

“Shut up,” Naminé grumbled, even though she did feel a little better.

“Dr. Uchiha, let it be known that if Dr. Nakano over here is in a foul mood just give her candy. Cheers her up every time,” Kurenai said to Kagami. Kagami looked up from his charts and gave them a sheepish smile. Naminé noticed how exhausted he looked and actually felt kind of bad. She was pretty sure the guy was in the middle of a thirty-hour call and the fact that she had a shitty attitude made her feel a little guilty. Residency was absolute hell, and the way she was acting definitely didn’t help.

“I wish I knew earlier during surgery. I think she traumatized Dr. Hagane and Dr. Kamizuki,” Kagami responded, referring to when the interns almost contaminated the sterile field and when Naminé may or may not have completely lost her shit on the two of them.

“I apologized,” Naminé said, popping more M&M’s into her mouth.

Kagami laughed, “yeah after you ripped them a new one.”

Naminé shrugged, “what’s being an intern if an attending doesn’t rip you apart at least once?”

“Or a resident,” Kurenai added.

“Or a fellow,” Naminé said as well, snickering with Kurenai when Kagami rolled his eyes.

“It scares me to think what you two would be like together as doctors,” Kagami said, looking at Kurenai and Naminé with a soft laugh. “You’re bad enough together as it is. I’d be terrified to think what an OR would look like with you both in it.”

“Behind every good doctor is a good nurse,” Kurenai said. Naminé didn’t even argue with that one because she didn’t disagree. The nurses were the ones who put up with the patients and rounded on them several times a day, whereas Naminé only rounded once, maybe twice a shift.

“She’s not wrong,” Naminé remarked, finishing the last of her M&M’s, thankful for both Kurenai and Kagami for calming her down.

“Speaking of,” Kagami muttered, putting his hand to his head as if he just remembered something, “Dr. Sarutobi said he wanted to talk to you, Kurenai. I completely forgot about it until just now.”

Naminé narrowed her eyes and looked at Kurenai in confusion, “the hell did you do that the chief wants to talk to you?”

“Sorry—not Chief Sarutobi. _Doctor_ Sarutobi—Asuma. He’s the fourth year ortho resident,” Kagami clarified.

Naminé didn’t miss the way a blush appeared on Kurenai’s cheeks or the way her eyes widened, “Kurenai?”

“Shut up,” Kurenai said, clearing her throat and pushing her hair back, probably trying to act natural, but she was still blushing. She got up from the nurses’ station to leave—presumably to meet Asuma somewhere, and Naminé couldn’t help but give her a wicked smirk.

“Where you going, Kurenai? The on call room?” She teased.

“Shut up, Nakano,” Kurenai warned, not even giving her a second glance.

Naminé actually cackled a bit and threw her M&M wrapper into the trash can. She actually really did feel better, probably for the first time since she clocked in.

“I’m glad you’re in better spirits, Dr. Nakano,” Kagami said with a small smile.

Naminé returned it, “I’m sorry for being such a pain earlier.”

He shook his head, “happens. I know I’ve been kinda mean to interns before.”

Naminé shrugged, “you’re a resident. That’s allowed with your hours.”

Kagami nodded and then he looked to be contemplating something, and whatever it was, he seemed to decide it was worth bringing up, because he walked closer to Naminé and immediately gave her an embarrassed smile, “any chance I could talk to you about something?”

Naminé raised an eyebrow, “sure?”

“I’ve started applying for fellowships, but I really want to stay here. I know it’s usually better to go somewhere else for it, but this is home and I was wondering if there was any way you could maybe put in a good word with the Chief of Surgery for me?”

Naminé blinked, “uh sure? But what kind of fellowship are you looking for? Because if you’re going for cardio thoracic you’re better off talking to Dr. Kito.”

“Well see that’s the thing. I want to do a trauma fellowship,” Kagami admitted, still giving her that sheepish smile.

Naminé blinked again. She wasn’t expecting that. But then again, maybe she should have. Kagami had spent a lot of time in the trauma clinic and he never turned down a chance to scrub in on a trauma surgery with her if he had the time.

“Oh yeah?” She asked.

Kagami put his hands on the back of his neck, “yeah. It’s what I want to do.”

Naminé let herself smile, a real genuine smile. She was a total softie when it came to other doctors wanting to come into her specialty, “I’ll talk to Chief Sarutobi.”

Kagami’s face lit up, “really?” She nodded and he grinned even harder, “thank you so much, Dr. Nakano!”

Naminé laughed under her breath, “don’t thank me just yet. Trauma isn’t as glamourous as you might think.”

He shrugged and put his hands in the pocket of his white coat, but still smiled ear to ear, “I don’t know if I believe that coming from you. I heard that you cracked a chest once in the ED. Doesn’t get more glamourous than that.”

Naminé paused. How the hell did he hear about that?

“That’s because you weren’t there,” but she smiled at him nonetheless. “One of the scariest moments in my life—and I’ve had a few.”

But Kagami couldn’t be deterred and he still smiled broadly at her and Naminé smiled in spite of herself. She may have sucked at helping herself, but if she could help Kagami? An overworked surgical resident who wanted to go into her specialty? Well hell. She would help him anyway she could.

“I gotta go, just got paged. But really, thank you Dr. Nakano. If there’s anything I can do to help you out just name it.”

“I doubt it, but I’ll keep that in mind,” she said, letting him be on his way.

With neither Kagami nor Kurenai to keep her distracted, Naminé was already getting distracted and annoyed again. So she turned her attention back to her charts, even though she wasn’t paying close enough attention to actually be completing them the way she should have been. But she couldn’t help it.

And who knows how much time went by, but after blankly looking at the charting for however long, Naminé decided it was time to take a break and get something to eat since she didn’t even get the chance to grab lunch earlier.

She walked downstairs, deciding on grabbing coffee instead of food, and tried not to think about the threat that was sitting upstairs in her desk drawer.

Which was really hard to do because every time she let her mind wander that’s exactly where it went.

“Large black coffee please,” Naminé said as her mind briefly came back to reality when the barista awkwardly cleared her throat when Naminé got to the front of the short line.

She paid and walked over to the bar that had cream and sugar, and grabbed four sugar packets and dumped them into her coffee. She could hear Kurenai or Chief Sarutobi telling her to ease up on the sugar in the back of her head and smirked in spite of herself, stirring the coffee around before going to head back upstairs.

That was when her phone rang at the same time she walked out and saw a very clearly disgruntled Tobirama Senju walking over to the café with his phone pressed to his ear.

Naminé didn’t even answer it and walked right up to him.

His eyes flickered in annoyance when he saw her, and he pulled her scrub cap out of his jacket pocket and held it out to her at a literal arm’s length distance. Naminé rolled her eyes and grabbed it, careful to avoid brushing her fingers against his so he didn’t have a goddamn conniption.

“Thanks,” she said under her breath.

He grunted in response and held his jacket open a bit to fish something out of the inside pocket, and then he was handing her a business card.

Naminé didn’t say anything, still upset from their phone call earlier. But she took the card anyway and looked at the name and her stomach sank.

“Are you kidding me?” She blurted after seeing the name _TOKA SENJU_.

“You said you wanted the closest thing to me. There you go,” he stated, and then his arms were crossing over his chest like always and Naminé was fighting back the overwhelming urge to just smack him.

“Toka is _not_ going to help me after—” she stopped herself when she caught Tobirama raising his eyebrows, silently daring her to finish that sentence. She swallowed and then decided against it.

“…If you could just not be vindictive for one second of your life and actually try to help me I would greatly appreciate it,” she said through her teeth, still glaring at Toka’s business card.

“You would know if I was being vindictive,” he said. Naminé’s eyes flashed up and he was still glaring at her.

Okay fine. She deserved that nasty look he gave her. But it still hurt and she still hated the fact that he hated her.

So she responded the only way she knew how to. By pressing his buttons.

“Sometimes I really wonder if you’re the worst person I’ve ever met.”

It was his turn to roll his eyes and she watched as his upper lip curled ever so slightly, “will that be all?”

 _No_. She thought bitterly to herself.

“Yes,” she said, clenching her scrub cap to anchor herself back down.

“Good,” he said back, already turning around leaving the hospital.

Her stomach hurt as she stood there until he was completely out of sight, holding her scrub cap until her hand ached.

It had been nine years and she still hated herself for leaving…

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's starting to feel like fall and I absolutely love it
> 
> Leave some feedback with a comment!


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Friendly reminder that I am not a doctor. I did a fair amount of Google research along with asking my family members in the medical field about this stuff, but yeah. If I got stuff wrong (probably did), I'm not a doctor.
> 
> Just a tax student who procrastinates her studies way too much.

“I see you found your scrub cap,” Kurenai said to Naminé as she walked into the locker room. Naminé gave Kurenai a bitter smile and pulled her cap off, tossing it in her work bag before peeling off her scrub top.

“Yeah, I had to fight off a bear for it,” Naminé remarked.

“Oh yeah?” Kurenai said back, wearing an amused smile.

“You wish I was joking,” Naminé muttered, putting on a long sleeved shirt. She changed out of her scrub pants and stepped into some sweatpants and shut her locker before she gave Kurenai her full attention and wiggled her eyebrows suggestively. “You gonna tell me about this Dr. Sarutobi of yours?”

Kurenai’s face went beet red and Naminé cackled.

“Zip it, Nakano.”

“Aw come on! Throw a girl a bone,” Naminé said with a laugh. “You know how long it’s been for me? Give me some dirty details _please_.”

“Not my fault that you can’t get any because you’re so frigid,” Kurenai retorted.

Naminé put her hand to her chest and feigned hurt, “rude!”

Kurenai laughed and her eyes met Naminé when she was finished changing out of her scrubs, “you expect me to believe that someone who looks like you doesn’t have anyone at home waiting around?”

Naminé snorted, “first of all: thank you, but I am a shell of my former self. Second of all: you’re the one who said I was frigid.”

Kurenai laughed again, “shell of your former self? Yeah right.” She gave Naminé a second look and grabbed her own work bag and slung it over her shoulder. “But seriously. You don’t have anyone waiting at home for you?”

Naminé shook her head, grabbing her stuff.

“That’s because you surgeons don’t have lives outside of the hospital,” Kurenai said.

Naminé was going to say to Kurenai that that was only half true, but she never got the chance because as they were leaving the locker room, someone else was coming in and Naminé almost popped a goddamn blood vessel when she saw who it was.

Naminé stopped dead in her tracks, locking gazes with Dr. Asami Matsuo.

“Naminé,” Asami drawled, her ice blue eyes sweeping across Naminé’s face and frame, “I was wondering when I would run into you.”

“Mm,” Naminé hummed with a grimace. If there was one thing she hated it was being called by her first name in the hospital. She was a well respected surgeon and busted her ass to get there. So when she was at work, unless you were Sasuke Sarutobi, you called her Dr. Nakano or just straight up Nakano. To be called anything else was disrespectful and it went right up Naminé’s ass. Especially since Asami was the one saying it.

“Dr. Matsuo,” She greeted finally, ready to run out of there.

“It’s been a long time,” Asami pressed. Naminé looked at Kurenai from the corner of her eye, but the nurse was only watching them with skeptical eyes.

“Not long enough,” Naminé retorted, her own eyes sweeping over Asami. The years had been kind to her, that was for sure. Asami had always been stunning, what with those icy blue eyes and dark hair. But as she aged she went from beautiful to _regal_ , and Naminé may or may not have hated her a little bit more for it.

Asami raised one eyebrow, “still have a sharp tongue I see. Hm, and you cut your hair.”

Naminé gave her a tight smile, one where her lips were tightly pressed together and where her neck strained itself. She really didn’t have it in her to deal with Asami right now. Not at all.

“Excuse me, I have to get home and feed my cat,” Naminé said, shoving passed the all too familiar woman with just a little too much force.

Naminé could hear Kurenai’s footsteps behind her, but she didn’t risk looking over her shoulder until she turned a corner and was out of view from the door to the locker room. And as soon as she was, she breathed a sigh of relief.

“I didn’t know you had a cat,” Kurenai said, cutting through Naminé’s hazy thoughts.

“I don’t,” Naminé said.

“You two don’t get along or something?” Kurenai asked, finally coming to walk beside her as they made their way to the parking lot.

“What gave that away? Was it the nasty look, lying about having a cat, or my _sharp tongue_?” Naminé retorted, impersonating Asami’s voice at that last bit.

“Hey, you always have a sharp tongue,” Kurenai said. “Maybe that’s why your sex life consists of vicariously living through your friends.”

Naminé shook her head in dramatic fashion, “impossible. I don’t have any friends.”

“Then what the hell am I, Nakano?” Kurenai remarked.

“The nurse who feeds me M&M’s and keeps me sane so I don’t scalp any of the interns,” Naminé said with ease.

“You feel that?” Kurenai asked, shooting her a look as they reached the doors of the hospital. “It’s your ice cold heart beginning to melt.”

“Ugh gross. Make it stop,” Naminé said, but she laughed under her breath anyway and Kurenai did the same.

They walked outside and Naminé already felt her teeth go on edge, looking for her car in the lot, praying that there were no more notes on her windshield.

“You in tomorrow?” Naminé asked, trying not to work herself up so much. At least she wasn’t walking outside alone.

“Nope. I’m off,” Kurenai flashed her a wide grin and Naminé actually frowned.

“Who’s going to feed me candy when I get cranky?” Naminé asked, giving the nurse an over exaggerated frown.

“Dr. Uchiha will have to,” Kurenai said as she laughed.

They reached Kurenai’s car and Kurenai waved goodnight, and then Naminé was on her own again, walking briskly to her car that was several spots away.

She reached her car and opened the door, slipping inside in relief and locking the doors. She ran her fingers through her hair, pushing it out of her face and going to put her work bag on the passenger’s seat when her eyes landed on a little book that definitely was _not_ there when she drove to work or even when she went to her car earlier to search for her scrub cap.

Naminé swallowed back the lump in her throat and put her horribly shaking hand to the book to pick it up and see what it was.

On the front of the book in a sort of red engraving was an upside down triangle inside of a circle, and directly above it the title was scrawled in a messy font.

_‘THE BOOK OF JASHIN’_

Naminé gasped and threw the book back in the passenger’s seat and covered her mouth when she actually let out a short scream.

He had been _inside_ her car…

She must have forgotten to lock her door when she came out earlier in the day and that was the only explanation she could come up with. Otherwise how else did he get inside without shattering one of her windows?

Which meant he must have been watching her when she came out to look for her scrub cap.

What if he was waiting for her when she got back home? He already proved to her that he knew where she lived. If he really came back to her car to leave his stupid religious book in there for her to find, then who was to say he wasn’t waiting for her at her house? Who was to say he wasn’t in the parking lot somewhere watching her?

She couldn’t go home. There was no way in hell she was going to do that. What if she walked up to her door and he was there and… And then…

Naminé grabbed her work bag and as fast as humanly possible, slipped out of her car, and _ran_ back inside the hospital.

* * *

“Dr. Nakano? What are you doing here?”

Naminé took in a deep breath, rubbing her eyes as she tried to wake up. She was still in her clothes from last night, the same ones she changed into just moments before she walked out to her car, and she was burning up from it, the back of her neck sweaty along with both her legs and her back.

She pulled herself into a seated position and yawned, squinting at the light that was now pouring into the on call room.

Kagami Uchiha stood in the threshold of the doorway, one eyebrow raised above the other in confusion.

“Good Morning, Dr. Uchiha,” Naminé groaned, blinking the sleep out of her eyes.

“Uh, good morning?” Kagami asked, still standing there awkwardly. “Have you been here all night?”

Naminé pushed her messy hair back and yawned, “looks like it.”

“…Why?”

She didn’t give him an answer. Instead, she got out of the bed, taking the sheets off, along with grabbing the rest of her stuff and headed for the door, brushing past Kagami as she did.

“All yours,” she said, her voice still gruff from sleep. On her way out, she dropped her sheets off in the laundry basket and headed for the locker room.

She pulled out her phone and checked the time. She still had a good hour and a half until she was supposed to be on the floor. She was relieved that she had plenty of time to grab a shower and freshen up as best as she could since she was going to have to wear her scrubs from yesterday.

So she went downstairs and improvised, taking a shower and using the almost empty travel soaps that lived in her work bag for the times she got bodily fluids on her at work and would have to shower in the middle of her shift.

Naminé sighed and ducked her head under the scalding hot water, letting it sear her skin. She always took her showers too hot, and didn’t think she had a half decent one unless her skin was red for a few minutes after getting out. There was just something about the way the hot water worked out knots in her back and neck—which she certainly had a few after sleeping on the rock hard bed in the on call room.

Her back twitched when there was an almost electric pain shooting through the center of it and she gritted her teeth, bracing her hands on the tiled wall.

That was when she remembered she ran out of her painkillers and Naminé groaned, contemplating if there was a way to just drown herself in the shower.

She had extra pills at home, but like _hell_ was she going back there alone. She didn’t care if she had to bribe Kurenai or Chief Sarutobi or hell—even Kagami—but Naminé was not going back to her house alone. No way.

And whenever she did go home, she was adding another lock to her door.

“ _Shit_ ,” she hissed, her back painfully twitching again.

But there wasn’t anything she could do about it. She’d just have to deal with the pain for now.

She finished up in the shower and towel dried her head, for once thankful for her short hair. Back when she had it long, it was such a process to wash and dry. At least with hair that barely brushed her shoulders she could just towel dry it and run her fingers through it and be done.

Naminé headed over to her locker and threw on her day old scrubs, slipping on her white coat, and stuffing her scrub cap into her pocket.

At least she had that again, and she actually felt herself calm down just a little bit as she wrapped her fingers around it in her pocket.

So feeling a little better, she grabbed some coffee, dumped four sugars in it, and went up to her office with just enough time to spare before she had to start her shift.

Naminé pulled her phone out along with the business card Tobirama gave her and her eyes caught the time. She doubted Toka would be up or at work before seven, but maybe that was better. Maybe Naminé could just leave a message to avoid the brunt of Toka’s wrath that she was sure to encounter.

Deciding to just do it before she lost her nerve, Naminé dialed the number.

She waited for the voicemail, but the phone only rang two times.

“Toka Senju,” the voice stated.

Naminé actually gaped and checked the time a second time. What the actual hell was Toka doing at work and sounding so awake before seven in the morning?

Naminé cleared her throat, so much for leaving a voicemail.

“Hi, Toka. This is Naminé Nakano and—”

“ _Pardon?_ ” Toka’s voice was low and Naminé seethed through her teeth. This was exactly what she she had been afraid of.

“Yes. It’s Naminé. I know. Shocking. I’m calling bec—”

“Where the hell did you get my number? Who the hell do you think you are giving me a phone call after all these years?” Toka ripped into her and Naminé actually leaned down and rested her forehead on her desk. The worst part about Toka was that Naminé couldn’t even give her any attitude back, because when Toka was pissed there was no getting a word in.

“Well see I’m calling bec—”

“Do my cousins know you’re calling me? Because I doubt very much that they’d like to hear that. Is this about Tobirama? I swear Naminé, you better stay away from him after that stunt you pulled. I can’t believe that you actually had the nerve to call _me_ of all people. What the hell is wrong with you? I thought you were supposed to be smart.”

“Toka, shut up!” Naminé shouted, clenching her jaw. “I got your number from Tobirama.”

Toka snorted, “of course you did. He was always an idiot when it came to you.”

If Naminé wasn’t so goddamn desperate and so goddamn scared for her life, she honestly would have cursed the woman out and hung up the phone. But she didn’t have that luxury. Not now at least.

“Could you just listen to me?” Naminé asked with a huff, pulling her head off the desk and leaning it heavily against her fist.

Toka was quiet and Naminé took that as a good sign.

“I’m calling because I need a criminal attorney and Tobirama gave me your card—and don’t worry about him because he only gave it to me so he never had to see me again. So you don’t have to give me shit about that, okay? My reasons for calling you are purely business related,” Naminé hissed, her stomach painfully twisting.

“Hmph,” she heard Toka mutter. “Well unfortunately for you I’m not taking on any new clients. Have a good day, Namin—”

“ _Toka, please!_ ” Naminé begged, surprising even herself at the sheer desperation in her tone that made her voice crack in pitch.

Toka was quiet again and Naminé’s eyes were getting hot. They were friends once. In another life the girls had been the best of friends, growing up around each other, going to high school together, doing all the stupid things that teenagers did together. Naminé knew that Toka had every right to be upset with her, but she needed her help and Naminé hated that she had to be put in this position. It was the same position she had been trying so hard to avoid. She had hoped that by moving back that she could have avoided it all together. But that was before yesterday.

“I need your help,” Naminé whispered, rubbing at her eyes. “Please. I’ll pay you whatever you want, you can have my entire year’s salary, but please. I-I’m desperate here.” Naminé hated how soft and scared she sounded, but she couldn’t help it. She _was_ scared.

“…What have you gotten yourself into, Naminé?” Toka asked with a heavy sigh.

Naminé sniffled and rubbed her eyes again before she could tear up anymore, “we’d need a whole lot of tequila to talk about that.”

It was quiet for a long moment; the way it always was when Toka was considering something.

“Give me the short version,” Toka stated. Naminé should have expected that, but that didn’t make her feel any less sick.

“In shortest possible terms, I have a stalker who knows where I work, where I live, what car I drive, and left me a threat yesterday and broke into my car. So I slept at the hospital because I’m too goddamn scared to go home.”

She heard Toka suck in a breath, “is that all? Just a stalker who’s following you then? They haven’t actually done anything to you, right? They’ve never laid a finger on you?”

Naminé was quiet, her back aching and her fingertips itching for something to numb the pain.

“Christ, they have. Haven’t they?” Toka breathed out.

Naminé picked at the corner of her fingernails, “yes.”

“…Do you have any time to stop by my office today?”

“Probably not until at least eight, but you’ll probably be home by then,” Naminé said, her eyes drifting to the time once again. She needed to be out on the floor to start rounds.

“I’ll be here,” Toka stated. Naminé couldn’t hold off the sigh of relief that escaped her.

“Can we keep this between just us?”

“Attorney-client privilege,” Toka promised.

“Thank you,” Naminé said, squeezing her scrub cap in her pocket. “I’ll let you know when I leave work.”

“All right. I’ll see you around eight then.”

* * *

Tobirama’s eyes were completely glazed over. He had spent the entire damn day reading over lawsuits and there just came a point where his eyes were tired. Truthfully, he didn’t have to do this. He technically wasn’t a practicing attorney anymore (though he did still keep his license up to date) but he did need to oversee Konoha Enterprises’ legal department at the moment since they were currently without a chief legal counsel—much to his dismay.

So it was just easier for him to pick up the slack than to let the department get overwhelmed and make a mistake with the paperwork or overlook something that shouldn’t have been.

Plus, he liked being able to keep his mind busy. Heaven knows he needed it right now.

He rubbed his eyes, hoping that would help.

It didn’t.

Without the legal jargon to distract him, his mind kept wandering back to a certain insufferable woman.

It was absolutely completely and totally ridiculous that he didn’t have better control of his thoughts. There was no discernable reason for his head to keep drifting back to an impossibly difficult trauma surgeon who had a chip on her shoulder and something to prove. But it wouldn’t stop and honestly, it was really pissing him off.

Tobirama had always been a model of composure and he prided himself on that. Even as a child he was like that. Where Hashirama was brash and impulsive, often getting too caught up in his emotions, Tobirama was cool and logical. But when Naminé entered the picture that all went right out the window.

He didn’t think he had ever known anyone in all his life that riled him up so easily. Hashirama, sure. And hell, even Madara on occasion, but neither of them had anything on Naminé, and she had been like that since they were all kids.

Even his father noticed when he was still alive. He would tell Tobirama that he needed to keep his head on straight, and Tobirama would get so angry because he _always_ kept his head on straight. It was just when Naminé came around did he lose himself. The years did absolutely nothing to change that either, only that he got better at controlling his actions. She could drive him up a wall all she wanted, but he stopped giving her such an outward reaction.

She was even like that when they were together. She was always just a little too sharp for her own good, and knew just what to say to get on his nerves and would know just how to smirk at him, and then he was back at square one, fuming and storming away.

Only when they were together, she knew how to soothe his temper too. A smile here, a soft touch there, and he would cool down, if only a little bit before she inevitably pressed his buttons and the whole thing started over again.

And there he was again, thinking about a woman he knew better than to think about.

“Any chance you could look this over? Financial reporting needs approval before they publish and legal is swamped,” Hashirama came into their temporary office space with a packet of paper that was far too thick to be a quick read and Tobirama frowned.

“I’ll look at it,” Tobirama said. He stood up to stretch his legs and took the papers from his brother. So much for leaving on time…

“Great,” Hashirama said. “Mind if I leave early? Mito isn’t feeling well and I hate when she has to eat dinner alone.” His brother gave him an embarrassed smile and rubbed the back of his head. Tobirama simply gave him a quick look and shrugged.

“Be my guest.”

“You sure you don’t want to stop over for dinner tonight? It won’t be for another couple of hours and you really should eat something,” Hashirama suggested. His eyebrows knit together with worry and Tobirama rolled his eyes.

“I’m sure.”

“I promise there won’t be any pretty blonde doctors this time,” Hashirama teased.

Tobirama huffed and set the packet of pages for him to look over down on the table and then crossed his arms. Back to this again? Really? Would Hashirama not learn that he wanted nothing to do with Naminé Nakano?

“Don’t look at me like that,” Hashirama said. “Speaking of pretty doctors, did you ever drop off said doctor’s scrub cap?”

Tobirama sighed, “yes.”

Hashirama grinned at him and his brother’s dark eyes lit up with excitement, “how was she?”

Tobirama frowned, “difficult.”

“Well that’s normal. Difficult is what you two do,” Hashirama said as he chuckled.

Tobirama’s temper began to flare. There was no such thing as something he and Naminé did as the ‘two’ of them, because there was no ‘two’ of them at all. They weren’t anything.

She had made that painfully clear almost a decade ago.

“I also gave her Toka’s business card so she has her attorney now and can leave me alone for good,” he stated, struggling to keep his tone in check and not snap.

Hashirama’s face fell, “you don’t mean that.”

“I do,” Tobirama said, making sure to keep his tone very stern. He needed to make sure his brother would stop meddling. If Hashirama wanted him to tolerate Naminé because she was someone from their collective past, then fine. He would grit his teeth and bear it for the sake of his late brothers and for the sake of Hashirama. But if his elder brother expected him and Naminé to ‘forgive and forget’, he was going to be severely disappointed.

Hashirama shook his head with a sigh, “I’ve got to get home to Mito. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Tobirama nodded and then his brother left him alone with no shortage of work.

Rolling his sore shoulders out, he sat down and picked up the packet of papers.

Then he started reading, thankful for the distraction from his thoughts.

* * *

Naminé walked into Chief Sarutobi’s office, still wearing her scrub cap from surgery earlier and picking at the corner of her nails. He looked away from his computer when she came in and gave her an easy smile.

“Naminé,” he started. “You look tired. Everything okay?”

Naminé cleared her throat. Here goes nothing.

“Actually, I was hoping you had a moment. I wanted to ask a favor,” she started. She kept her chin up high and swallowed back her nerves.

“Go on,” Chief Sarutobi said, gesturing for her to sit down.

“I know this might sound weird, but hear me out,” she said carefully. “I was hoping you could write me a prescription for my back. I’ve got a lot of pain and—”

“Still?” His eyebrows knit together and he folded his fingers onto each other. “After all these years you’re still having back pain?”

“I do and it’s bad,” she said.

“Well maybe you should get some scans and we can see what the problem is? A little tenderness is to be expected, but you shouldn’t have severe back pain after all this time,” he said as he gave her a fatherly smile.

Naminé cleared her throat, “to be fair, Chief. I really don’t want to go through another procedure.” She paused to make sure he wasn’t going to refute her point, but he didn’t. He just nodded, still intent on listening. “I still haven’t found a new doctor in the area so I don’t have anyone I can go to. But my pain is getting worse and I can’t sleep, operating is starting to become a chore, and I can’t even get my paperwork done because sitting at a desk is just excruciating. I just need a little something to ease it.”

Sasuke nodded again, but his eyebrows were still knit together, “do you want a muscle relaxer? Maybe Baclofen?”

Naminé shook her head almost instantaneously, “actually I was hoping maybe you could write one for Vicodin or Percocet.”

Sasuke stopped nodding and was very, very still.

“Naminé, I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you why that may be a very dangerous suggestion,” he said very slowly.

Naminé picked at her fingernails, hard enough that one broke.

“I know,” Naminé tried. “I just need something short term because it’s getting to the point where the pain never stops.”

Sasuke looked at her for a long time but then he nodded and ran his hand across his chin, “okay. I’ll write you a one time script for Percocet I guess.”

Naminé exhaled in relief, “thank you, Chief.”

“Of course. But if the pain persists after you’re done I want you to see someone from ortho, okay?”

“Absolutely,” Naminé said.

“All right,” Chief Sarutobi sighed and wrote her up the prescription and handed it to her with a frown. “You can just fill that in house.”

Naminé thanked him again and slipped out of his office with every intention of heading straight to the hospital’s pharmacy, but that’s when her pager went off and Naminé groaned, picking it up and reading the message that told her to get to OR 1 and to do it fast.

So she held off on going to the pharmacy and got to the OR, quickly scrubbing in and gowning up as someone was wheeled in.

Kagami came in and starting scrubbing up, craning his neck to see the patient.

“What happened?” He asked. Naminé could hear that his voice was still heavy with sleep and couldn’t help but feel sympathetic, remembering her own residency and all the times she would try to get a couple hours of sleep only to be woken up to rush into surgery.

“Not sure,” Naminé admitted as she slipped her mask on.

She approached the patient and assessed the damage. The patient had to have been shot with the damage to the abdomen. Only bullets could leave wreckage like that in their path. Her eyes then drifted up to the patient’s face and Naminé stared in disbelief.

“It's a kid,” Naminé blurted.

Kagami was then standing on the other side of her, assessing the damage with wide dark eyes.

“How does a kid like her get shot?” Kagami asked under his breath.

“Dr. Nakano, we need to move,” one of the scrub nurses reminded from beside Naminé. Naminé stared at the girl’s face and then looked back at her gunshot wound and nodded.

“I’m gonna get you out of this, don’t you worry,” Naminé said the girl, even though she knew she couldn’t hear her.

Over her dead body would she let this child die on her operating table.

Not if she had anything to do with it.

* * *

Naminé closed her locker and sat down on the bench, putting all of her stuff in her work bag. She had to go home tonight and there was no way around it. She needed a fresh pair of scrubs and she needed to sleep in her own bed again so she wasn’t so exhausted during the day. She just hoped that talking to Toka would put her at ease so she wasn’t so scared when she got home. Though she seriously doubted it.

Standing up with a stretch, Naminé pulled an orange pill canister of Percocet out of her bag and looked at it, considering whether or not she wanted to take anything just yet.

It was only a ten day supply so she had to make it last. But still…

Naminé poured two pills out and swallowed them dry before dropping the bottle back in her bag.

She pushed her hair out of her face and left the locker room. It was a little past eight and she knew that if she made Toka wait too long she would chew her out. Granted, Toka was almost guaranteed to chew her out regardless of what she did, but minimizing that would be best.

But before Naminé left, she made a detour by stopping upstairs to check on her patient from earlier.

Naminé walked through the surgical floor, going straight to the girl’s room.

The girl, a twelve-year-old named Kanna Otsutsuki, was still asleep, so Naminé only stopped to take a look at her charts, making sure that all her vitals were okay. As far as she could tell they were, but the girl would have a long way to go before she recovered, and she was still at risk for internal bleeding. But she was safe for now, and Naminé was happy with that.

“With how often you’re here I’d say you’re a resident again.”

Naminé set Kanna’s chart down and looked over her shoulder to give Kagami a smirk.

“Sometimes it feels like that,” she laughed softly. “I know you’re done your thirty-hour shift. What are you still doing here?” Naminé asked.

“Just finishing up my rounds and then I’m gone for the next twenty-four hours,” Kagami explained.

“Wow. A whole twenty-four hours? What are you going to do with that time?” She teased.

“Sleep,” Kagami answered without missing a beat. Naminé smirked. She remembered that same feeling of total exhaustion, where it was tiring to even blink.

“Well Dr. Uchiha, I hope you have a good day off,” she said.

“Thanks.”

Naminé snuck one last look at Kanna and then she was leaving, heading downstairs to go out to her car.

Her hands clenched around the strap of her bag as she walked out by herself, and dread coiled in her stomach. It wasn’t so much that she was nervous because she was alone, though that definitely was part of it, but it was the fact that she knew she would get in her car and that stupid religious book would still be in there.

Naminé got to her car and yanked the door open, getting inside and locking herself in. Her breath was shaky and when she saw the book on the passenger’s seat where she threw it last night, and a wave of nausea came over her. So Naminé grabbed it and tossed it in her back seat. It could serve as proof for Toka along with the photograph that she found on her windshield.

She sent Toka a quick text to let her know that she was on her way and drove to the woman’s law firm.

It was only about twenty minutes from the hospital, and Naminé pulled into the parking lot as close to the front door as possible, and got out, half relieved and half terrified to see her old friend again.

“Your hair is short,” were the first words out of Toka’s mouth when she let her in, and Naminé rolled her eyes.

“You sound like Hashirama,” Naminé retorted.

Toka shrugged, “I’ve known you since we were five and not once have I ever seen you with hair above your chest.”

Naminé pursed her lips together, “it was time for a change.”

Toka didn’t respond to that, she just turned around and ushered Naminé to follow her into her office.

“Do you want coffee?” Toka asked after they both sat down at the desk. Naminé shook her head. She only drank coffee in copious amounts at work, plus she wanted to sleep tonight and didn’t think that would help.

“Okay then,” Toka opened her laptop to take notes and then she gave Naminé every ounce of her undivided attention, “tell me everything.”

Naminé’s hands were trembling, so she stopped them by picking at her nails and wishing she had her scrub cap to hold on to.

“Back when I was in the second year of my fellowship, a guy came in. He had all of these crazy injuries. Punctured organs, stab wounds, chunks of his skin shaved off, just really weird shit. It looked like he had been interrogated or was part of some gang initiation. And most importantly, he had a stab wound to his chest. When he came in to our hospital we couldn’t get him up to the OR fast enough because it was still being prepped, but he was dying on the gurney. He had a pericardial tamponade and he needed the sac around his heart drained or else he was going to die.

“So I cracked his chest in the ED and drained the sac, which is no small feat. This is a really serious procedure, Toka. And it didn’t matter that it was in a level one trauma center or not—cracking a chest in the ED really should never be done unless the patient is guaranteed to die without it.”

Toka nodded, typing away on her laptop and Naminé looked down at the desk.

“But it worked. I saved his life, and we got him up to the OR where our cardio thoracic surgeon repaired his ventricle. So after the surgery and when this patient woke up, the cardio thoracic surgeon explained to him what happened and that I was the one who saved his life and that I had to crack his chest and what it entailed.”

Naminé cleared her throat, “apparently he was really interested at the whole concept of a thoracotomy and asked to talk to me. So I stopped by and explained everything as best as I could and he seemed really grateful. He was just really interested though. It was actually a little weird. Like you wouldn’t expect that level of interest from anyone who wasn’t a surgical intern or in the medical field.”

“How so?”

“I don’t know. He just kept asking if I used a gigli saw or a rib spreader and if there was a lot of blood—it was just odd, Toka.”

Toka nodded and Naminé went on.

“He recovered and went on his way.”

“Did he show any interest in you while he was in the hospital?” Toka cut in, her eyes narrowing.

Naminé shrugged, “I guess a little. But it wasn’t so much me, it was the thoracotomy and the fact that I was the one who performed it.”

“Hm.”

“But then a couple weeks after he was discharged I started seeing him a lot. Me and some of the other fellows would go out to this one bar and I had never seen him there before, and then after he was he discharged I saw him all the time. I talked to him the first few times—just more out of professional obligation than anything else. And then some of the fellows were starting to get creeped out because he would be at the bar, he would show up to the cafes we would go to for lunch, and he even would show up around the hospital from time to time.

“This went on for months, but that’s all it was. He would show up and maybe stare at me, but that was it. So we just kind of left it alone. A-and then we started getting more and more guys like him coming into the ED. No one was in as worse shape as him, but they all had these gruesome injuries. Most of the doctors just thought it was gang related, but a story came out on the news that they…” Naminé’s breath got caught in her throat, reliving the moment all over again.

“They were doing it to _themselves_ ,” Naminé whispered. “It had to do with their religion. They inflicted injuries on themselves and they believed in human sacrifices to their god.”

“And he was a follower of this religion—this cult?” Toka asked.

Naminé nodded, “yeah. Anyway, after this story broke I started seeing him more and more. He started getting in my face, telling me all about this god Jashin of his. And I tried to get a restraining order but since he never threatened me or touched me I couldn’t.”

Her eyes were starting to get hot and Naminé’s fingertips itched, “he stalked me for another two and a half years. He got in my face and sometimes would grab my wrist or my arm, but that was about it.”

Her throat was beginning to burn, “one night me and some of the other doctors were at the bar, and it was only about three or four blocks away from my apartment, so when I was done drinking I walked back alone and… And…”

Naminé’s eyes burned and she swallowed.

“Take your time,” Toka said softly.

“He was in an alley, grabbed me by my ponytail and dragged me in there. He beat me up pretty good,” she coughed in an attempt to hide the shaking of her voice. “Had some freaky miniature scythe looking thing too. He cut me up with that, preaching about his god and…” She stopped, sucking in a sharp breath.

“Is that why you cut your hair?” Toka asked.

Naminé blinked away the fogginess in her eyes and her hand went to the back of her head, feeling the length of her hair that just barely touched her shoulders.

“Am I that obvious?”

Toka gave her a familiar smile, “you’ve had long hair your whole life.”

Naminé looked away, “he had this weird fixation with my blood. And I know that he was going to kill me because he wouldn’t shut up about how Jashin would be so pleased with me as a sacrifice, but when he grabbed me I dropped my stuff and one of the doctors I had been with left the bar and saw it and knew it was mine, and he came looking.”

“So did this guy run away?”

“Yeah,” Naminé said, sniffling just a bit. “I had to go to the hospital since I was so messed up, and now I’ve got lovely scars all over my stomach and legs,” Naminé tried to give Toka a smile, but the woman didn’t return it. She just frowned at Naminé. “But I’ve got all the paperwork that documents everything. When I was still living there I went to the cops and I took all the right steps to make sure he was arrested and thrown in jail. I hired an attorney, and he told me that he would work the case and have it over and done with in a matter of weeks.”

Naminé twiddled with the sleeves of her shirt, “but nothing’s come of it. And now Hidan is showing up here and leaving these in my car.”

Naminé reached down into her work bag and pulled out the book along with the photograph with the threat written on it. She slid them both across the desk to Toka and the Senju woman took them both with a very serious look on her face.

“I want you to be my new attorney and put him away for good so he can’t do it to anyone else,” Naminé stated.

Toka’s upper lip curled at the book, but she glared so fiercely at the photograph that Naminé had half the mind to think it would burst into flames.

“Forget him not doing it to anyone else. He wants to finish what he started with you,” Toka murmured, still glaring at the objects. “You moved here to try and get away, right?”

Naminé nodded, “when Sasuke Sarutobi called me about the job at Hidden Leaf Hospital it seemed like the perfect cover to leave.”

Toka gave a great sigh and leaned back, “I need you to send me every piece of paperwork you have on the case along with anything else related to the assault.”

“Absolutely.”

The Senju woman then gave Naminé a long look and frowned, “did you ever talk to anyone about this?”

Naminé actually scoffed, “are you kidding? Talk to some shrink and then have them tell me I’m not in the right headspace to operate? No thank you. Hidan already left enough of his marks on my body. I won’t give him anything else, especially not my ability to operate and save lives.”

“Fair enough,” Toka yielded. “But maybe it’s something to think about it.”

Naminé didn’t say anything.

“I don’t suppose you have a roommate or some type of guard dog?” Toka asked when the silence stretched on.

“No,” Naminé mumbled.

“Of course you don’t,” Toka remarked. “Maybe we can get some cops to watch your house.”

Naminé shook her head, “no, that’ll make him angry and I don’t know what he’ll do if he gets angry. I’ll be fine. I’ll sleep in my office if I have to.”

Toka scratched the back of her head, “I’ll figure something out. Just send me everything you’ve got and I’ll put the bastard away for life.”

Naminé’s eyes were getting hot again, “thank you, Toka.”

Toka’s eyes flashed to hers and she wore a grim expression when she spoke, “Naminé, I’m sorry about what happened to you. I really am, and I will do whatever I can to get this sicko off the streets and away from you… But this doesn’t mean I forgive you.”

Naminé actually let out a short laugh in spite of herself, giving Toka a bitter smile. She expected nothing less of the woman. Not at all. And honestly, it was the biggest source of comfort she had since moving back home.

“Well that’s good because I don’t forgive myself either.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lol sorry to ya'll who like Hidan, but he's such a creep that he was too perfect to not use as the stalker.
> 
> Slower chapter but a necessary one. I make up for it a bit with the next one. Leave some feedback with a comment!
> 
> Also. I'm not a doctor lol.


	5. Chapter 5

_“Aw don’t look at me like that,” a little girl, no more than nine said to the boy with white hair and red eyes across from her. She pouted her lower lip and hid her arms behind her back, her eyes flickering over to the boy’s older brother. “Hashi, tell him.”_

_“You know she didn’t mean anything by it,” the boy with brown hair said to his little brother, still chuckling. “Nami just likes to get a reaction out of you.”_

_The boy with white hair crossed his arms and still glared at the little blonde girl in front of him._

_“It’s ridiculous to even suggest that,” the boy said to her._

_“Is not!” She immediately shouted, taking a step closer to him._

_“Is too,” he growled._

_“Is not!” She demanded again._

_“Nami, I’ll do it,” a black haired boy cut in. He grinned at the blonde girl and his elder brother who stood beside Hashirama rolled his eyes. But the girl didn’t even look at him._

_“No, Izuna. I want Tobirama to do it,” the little blonde crossed her arms and stood close enough to Tobirama that he could feel her breath on his face._

_Tobirama glared even harder, “why!”_

_“Because she obviously likes you for some reason,” the other boy beside Hashirama retorted, rolling his eyes in annoyance. Tobirama ignored his words and instead turned that icy stare to him instead._

_“Madara, stop,” Hashirama said, though he was laughing into his hand when he looked at the look of sheer irritation on his younger brother’s face._

_“Fine. But when Asami and all of her stupid friends make fun of me and when I start crying just know it’s all your fault, Tobirama,” Nami stated, glaring at Tobirama with all the force a nine-year-old could muster._

_Tobirama gritted his teeth, a blush appearing on his cheeks, “why does she even care? Why do you care?”_

_“Because I do! It doesn’t have to be long!” Nami tried again. “Plus, it’ll make Asami jealous.” The little blonde snickered to herself and Hashirama couldn’t stop the laugh that overtook him. Even Madara had to hold in his own laughter at the girl’s reasoning._

_Tobirama rolled his eyes, “no.”_

_Nami glared at him, “what are you? Scared?”_

_Tobirama’s cheeks turned the color of his eyes and he clenched his hands into fists, “of course not!”_

_“Just kiss her, Tobirama!” Hashirama said with a chuckle, enjoying how uncomfortable his little brother was. “She won’t leave you alone until you do.”_

_“You’re insufferable!” Tobirama shouted at Nami._

_“Where’d you learn that word? Your old man?” She stuck her tongue out and placed her hands on her hips. This time Madara couldn’t even hold in his laughter, and he and Hashirama both leaned over, laughing at the look of horror on Tobirama’s face._

_Tobirama gaped at her, completely and utterly flustered and annoyed._

_“You’re a chicken,” Nami tacked on when he didn’t say anything because he was so agitated._

_“And you’re obnoxious,” he said back._

_“You might as well kiss her, Tobirama. No other girl will ever do it,” Madara pointed out, smirking at the younger Senju brother._

_Tobirama went to glare at Madara but before he could, there were two hands on either side of his face and then the briefest contact, so short he wasn’t even sure it happened, on his lips._

_His red eyes widened and then the pressure on his lips was gone and Nami’s entire face was pink and her own eyes were just as wide as his. Then she covered the lower half of her face with her hands and ran away before he could say anything._

_He could hear his brother’s hysterical laughing behind him, “Tobiram—”_

Tobirama’s eyes snapped open at the sound of his phone ringing. He groaned, sitting up on his sofa where he had passed out last night and put one hand to his sore shoulder and used the other to grab his cell phone.

“Hello?” He asked, his voice still thick with sleep.

“Did I wake you?” the voice on the other end asked. Tobirama recognized the unamused voice that belonged to Toka and he rubbed his eyes, only grunting in response.

“Why did you send Naminé to me for help?” Toka deadpanned.

Tobirama couldn’t help the nasty glare that came over his face at her question. Sure, he probably should have warned Toka, but when the hell was he supposed to do that with his work schedule? He didn’t get home until after midnight and didn’t fall asleep for another couple of hours when he passed out on his couch by accident.

“She wanted the best and you’re the best,” he grumbled, gritting his teeth as he tried to rub out a painful knot in his shoulder.

“So it’s not because you wanted to keep her around the family, right?”

Tobirama stopped rubbing his shoulder and actually paused, “what?”

“I had to ask,” Toka said.

He frowned, “I don’t know how many times I have to say it, but I don’t care what she does. Now are we done here? I have to get ready.”

Toka paused before she responded to him, “did she say anything to you about why she wanted a criminal attorney? Anything at all?”

Tobirama actually huffed, “no.”

“Hm. That’s unlike her,” Toka muttered. Tobirama rolled his eyes so hard that they might as well have rolled back into his head. “Either way, I tried to call Hashirama but he didn’t answer. You should tell him to give her a call and see if he’ll let her stay with him for a few days.”

His eyes narrowed and he straightened up where he sat. It was unlike Toka to be so concerned.

“Why?” he asked.

“I thought you didn’t care,” she said right away.

Tobirama glared, “you can’t say something like that and not expect me to ask about it when it involves my brother.”

“I’m not at liberty to say. But I mean it, Tobirama. She really shouldn’t be alone right now, and I know Hashirama likes her for whatever reason. It wouldn’t even be a burden because she’s at the hospital most of the time. I’d let her stay with me but I don’t have the space right now.”

Tobirama hated himself for the worry that was creeping into his gut, but he couldn’t deny it and asked, “is she in danger or something?”

“I already told you I’m not at liberty to say. Attorney-client privilege, Tobirama. You should know that better than anyone,” Toka told him, her voice stern, making it clear that she wasn’t going to budge an inch.

His mind drifted back to the other night when he walked her out and the way she actually screamed when a squirrel ran out from under her car.

“This doesn’t have anything to do with her being too scared to walk out to her car alone at night, does it?”

He heard Toka let out a very long sigh, “just talk to Hashirama or tell him to call me.”

She then hung up and Tobirama sighed.

It was normal to be curious, that was human nature. So he tried not to let his lingering feelings of curiosity bother him.

But it did.

He was torn between worrying about the insufferable woman and being irritated with himself for worrying. He shouldn’t have been worried at all. She was a grown woman who could take care of herself, but at the same time, the thought of something bad happening to Naminé still didn’t sit well with him. In the words of Hashirama, she was one of the few people left who still remembered their late brothers, and that made her one of them. And even though Tobirama had his issues with her, he didn’t disagree with his brother.

Trying to brush it off, he stood up and made his way to his bathroom to take a shower and get ready to head into Konoha Enterprises.

That was when his dream crossed his mind again and Tobirama was suddenly angry with himself all over again.

What the hell was wrong with him? He saw Naminé twice in nine years and suddenly he couldn’t stop thinking about her?

It was absolutely ridiculous and he needed to put an end to it.

She wasn’t worth his time or his energy.

* * *

“And she’s awake!” Naminé greeted with a huge smile on her face when she walked into Kanna Otsutsuki’s room in the morning.

The black haired girl blinked heavily and looked at Naminé with her eyebrows knitting together, “are you my doctor?”

“You actually have several doctors,” Naminé moved further into her room and picked up her chart to see how her vitals did overnight and how they were right now. “But I’m the surgeon who operated on you when you came in.”

Naminé set her chart down and smiled at her, “I’m Dr. Nakano.”

Kanna gave her a timid smile, “am I okay, Dr. Nakano?”

“Your vitals look good for a girl who’s just been shot,” Naminé said. “Just so you know, you’re going to have to talk to the police when you’re feeling better. It’s standard protocol for any gunshot wounds.”

Kanna nodded, “are my parents here?”

“I believe they went downstairs to get some breakfast,” Naminé said. “But since you’re awake and since I’m here, how’s your pain on a scale of one to ten, with ten being the worst pain of your life?”

Kanna looked thoughtful and shrugged, “maybe a seven?”

Naminé nodded, “okay, we’ll get you something for that. I’ll have my favorite nurse come in to take care of you. Her name is Kurenai and she’s great. Does that sound okay?”

Kanna nodded again, but then she was frowning, “my head feels so full.”

Naminé made sure not to frown so she didn’t scare the girl, but she pulled out her penlight and walked over to Kanna, examining her eyes. But everything seemed to be responsive? She made a mental note to call down to neuro for a consultation to make sure everything was okay before she got herself all worked up.

 “Okay, I’ll see what I can do about that,” Naminé told the girl, slapping a professional smile on her face. Kanna nodded and Naminé slipped out of her room, already looking for an intern to send down to neuro to grab her one of the attendings for a consult.

Naminé stopped at the nurses’ station and smirked at Kurenai when she saw the brunette typing on the computer, “how was your day off, Kurenai? Spend it with any sexy ortho residents?”

Kurenai’s eyes widened and she looked over her shoulder to see if anyone heard her and then reached up to smack Naminé in the arm, “I’m going to kill you.”

Naminé grinned, “I tend to have that effect on people.”

“It’s because you are downright obnoxious,” Kurenai hissed.

Naminé put her hand on her chest, still smirking at her friend, “sticks and stones, Kurenai. Sticks and stones.”

Kurenai huffed, “I guess now is the perfect time to tell you that Dr. Matsuo asked us to send you up to her. She needs a consult.”

“Go figure. I was just about to send an intern to get me someone from neuro for the same reason,” Naminé said. “Can you do me a favor and really take care of my patient in 34A? She’s just a kid and got shot in her abdomen yesterday, but she’s complaining of her head hurting for some reason.”

Kurenai nodded, “sure thing. Guess she’s the consult?”

“That would be the one,” Naminé confirmed. “I’m gonna go see my best friend Dr. Matsuo.” Naminé couldn’t help it when her eyes rolled.

“Sounds good. Oh and Chief Sarutobi told me to let you know that you’re behind on your paperwork.”

Naminé scoffed, “what are you? My keeper?”

“As a matter of fact I am,” Kurenai gave her a smug look that Naminé ignored as she started walking down the hallway.

“Tell one of the interns to get me someone from neuro please!” She called out, already halfway down the hall.

She caught Kurenai giving her a dismissive wave and Naminé turned back around and braced herself for Asami’s unpleasantness, heading upstairs.

When she got up there she headed in the direction of the nurses’ station, but ended up not having to because Asami was already approaching her, the nasty look visible on her face even from down the hall.

“Here we go,” Naminé murmured to herself.

“Naminé,” Asami said when she got closer. Naminé sucked in a sharp breath through her nose. Heaven forbid Asami be respectful and call her ‘Dr. Nakano’.

“Dr. Matsuo,” Naminé said back.

“You’ve got a lot of nerve,” Asami wasted no time getting in Naminé’s face, her ice blue eyes boring into her. Naminé blinked. What had she done?

“Excuse me?”

“You leave in the most dramatic way imaginable, you cut all possible ties with everyone you ever knew, and then you come back nine years later with a bad haircut, sharp tongue, and a frigid cold disposition and yet you still end up head of a department and with Hashirama eating out of the palm of your hand. You’ve always had nerve, Naminé. I’ll give you that. But attempting to steal my patient? How dare you? Who do you think you are?”

Naminé stared at her in silence. What the hell was she talking about?

“My haircut isn’t bad,” She said under her breath, her hand going up to touch her hair. “And what do you mean stealing a patient? You called me for a consult.”

Asami stared at her, probably about to rip into her again, but decided against it. She only took a deep breath to compose herself before she straightened up and backed away.

“Your ‘consult’ is at the end of the hall. You’ll understand then.”

Asami stormed off, leaving a very confused Naminé behind her.

But she rubbed the back of her head and headed down the hall, reaching the last room and knocked two times before entering.

“Hello I’m—” she stopped.

“Nami!”

She tried to hold back a sigh. So this was why Asami ripped into her.

“I really would prefer it if you called me Naminé, Hashirama. Or better yet Dr. Nakano.”

Hashirama ignored her and stood up and embraced her in a tight hug, one that Naminé only returned with an uncomfortable pat on his back. When he released her he was grinning from ear to ear and she clenched her jaw. She then looked at Mito and gave her a tight smile.

“Mito, how are you feeling? What brings you in?”

Mito waved her hand dismissively, “just came in for a checkup. How are you? You look exhausted.” Mito’s face contorted into a worried frown and Naminé swallowed hard and looked between the couple.

“I always look exhausted when I’m at work,” She awkwardly shifted her weight onto her other hip. “What’s going on? I was called in for a consultation. Is everything okay? Did you have another fall?”

Her eyes focused on Mito, but the redhead just smiled and shook her head.

“Oh no.”

“Then…” She trailed off, hoping one of them would explain what was going on, all while she heard Asami’s words in the back of her head.

 “Well,” Hashirama shifted a bit and then he was at Mito’s side, holding her hand. “We were wondering if you would maybe consider being Mito’s doctor.”

Naminé stared at them, her mouth suddenly very, very dry.

“Um,” her eyes flickered between the pair several times. “If you don’t mind me asking, who is your doctor currently?”

“Dr. Matsuo,” Mito answered.

Well no wonder Asami was about ready to scalp Naminé.

“Asami is wonderful,” Hashirama cut in. “I know you two haven’t always been on the best terms, but she’s been fantastic and she’s our friend. But we were thinking… Well. Maybe…” Hashirama stumbled over his words and Naminé sighed.

“That’s really sweet, but Asami is an incredible doctor. She spent years learning how to deliver babies, how to operate on them, how to save both a mother and a child should something terrible happen. Really, I’m flattered. But Asami is by far the better choice.”

“Well surely you’ve delivered babies before,” Mito said with a soft smile.

Naminé nodded, trying to ease up a bit, “I have but it was back in my first two years of residency, and that was only in surgical cases. I don’t really deliver babies—not unless I absolutely have to because of some type of accident, and if that happens there’s a neonatal surgeon to do it, and then I’m really just assisting to make sure the mother is okay.”

“Are you sure, Nami? We’d love to have you do it,” Hashirama was giving her that warm smile again, the same one that always helped him get his way.

“I’m positive. I operate on people who have been in terrible car crashes, who have been shot or stabbed, or maybe taken a really bad fall. I’ve even operated on people impaled on trees and all sorts of other nasty things you can think of. Nowhere in my credentials do I have the skills to deliver a baby confidently,” she said, trying to be gentle. “But Asami does, and she’s the best. You’re smart to have her as a doctor.”

“It was worth a shot,” Mito said, still smiling warmly at her.

“It was,” Hashirama chuckled.

“Well if that’s all, I have to get going,” Naminé said, ready to go back down to work. She appreciated the sentiment. She really did. But that was still getting a little too close to her old life, and she wasn’t ready for that just yet. She doubted she ever would be.

“Before you go,” Hashirama said, moving away from Mito and placing a hand on Naminé’s shoulder. “I spoke with Toka earlier. Is everything all right?”

She could feel her eyes widen.

“I’m sorry?” She asked. There was no way Toka broke the attorney-client privilege, was there?

Hashirama’s eyebrows knit together in worry, “she told me that you might need a place to stay for a few days. Well actually she told Tobirama, but—”

“She told _Tobirama_?” Naminé asked, already gaping at him.

“Oh no! Not like that!” Hashirama urged, trying to calm her down with a sheepish smile. “She just couldn’t get in contact with me, so she tried him. That’s all I promise! I just wanted to make sure that everything was okay and that you’re safe.”

She sighed and her hands went into the pockets of her white coat and she squeezed her scrub cap that was in there until her hand shook.

“I’m safe, Hashirama. Toka just overstepped.”

The way he looked at her made it painfully clear that he didn’t believe her. Growing up he always gave her that look when she lied to him. He would look all stern and frown at her all disappointed until she cracked under the look and told him the truth. But it wouldn’t work this time. This time Hashirama didn’t need to know anything.

“Well even if she did,” it was Mito cutting in now, getting down from the examination table and walking over to Naminé and taking her hand. “You’re always welcome to stay with us.”

And just like that, it was too much and suddenly Naminé felt like she couldn’t breathe. Why were they being so _nice_? She hadn’t done anything to deserve Hashirama’s kindness or even Mito’s for that matter. Sure, she and Hashirama had history, but Mito? Naminé couldn’t think of one thing she did for Mito to be so kind to her. All she could think was that the woman knew Naminé was an old friend of the Senju’s, but if she knew about how she left all those years ago, she doubted Mito would like her. Mito didn’t seem like someone who would take kindly to something like that.

“I-I’m sorry, I have to go,” Naminé said with her voice getting hoarse and slipping out of the room. She briskly headed to the elevator to get away from the couple and kept punching the buttons over and over again until the doors finally opened up and she went inside, jamming the button to make the door close so she wouldn’t have to deal with someone coming in.

The doors shut and she let out a breath and put her hand in her other pocket to pull out two pills and popped them, swallowing them with a grimace.

She knew it was purely mental and nothing else, but Naminé felt her body actually relax the minute she took the pills and rested her head on the wall behind her as she watched the floors tick by.

Then she was back on the surgical floor as if nothing ever happened.

* * *

“When was the last time you had anything substantial to eat?” Kurenai asked, throwing herself into the chair across from Naminé in the hospital cafeteria. Naminé had been nursing a cup of coffee and some peanut M&M’s for lunch when Kurenai found her.

“This is substantial,” Naminé said, gesturing at her pathetic lunch. “My M&M’s have fat and carbs, the peanuts have protein, and my coffee has four sugars in it. The brain runs on glucose, so between all of that I think I have plenty of substance here.”

Kurenai actually let out a laugh and shook her head, “you’re a piece of work, Nakano. You know that?” Naminé only grinned and winked at her, which caused Kurenai to roll her eyes and respond with, “and you’re gonna rot your teeth with all of that crap.”

“Already have. I have eleven fillings.”

“Somehow I’m not surprised.”

Naminé shrugged, putting her overly sweet coffee to her lips as Kurenai unpacked a salad, an apple, and pretzels for her own lunch. She couldn’t remember if she ever ate healthy like that during her career as a surgeon. Maybe back during her intern year when Tobirama made her bring lunch to work because he would say she would pass out without proper food.

The thought of him made her stomach churn and she set her coffee down.

“You look like you just bit a lemon,” Kurenai said casually, pouring dressing on her salad.

“Do I?” Naminé asked.

“It’s all that sugar. It’s making you sick,” Kurenai’s voice was light when she said it, but Naminé didn’t feel any better. How many times had Tobirama said the same thing to her?

“Not possible. I get sick without it, not with it.”

Kurenai laughed, “because you’re addicted.”

Naminé forced a smile onto her face, “everyone’s got their addictions. Mine just happens to be sugar.”

“And fear of intimacy,” Kurenai said with a chuckle. Naminé gaped at her but Kurenai just smirked at continued to eat her salad. “Speaking of your crippling fear of intimacy and getting close to anyone—”

“Tread carefully,” Naminé warned, though there was no weight behind her words.

“While I do enjoy our lunches together, why don’t you sit with the other surgeons?”

Naminé put her coffee to her lips, feeling her stomach finally settle a bit. “Because surgeons are the most arrogant people you’ll ever meet, I have enough arrogance myself, and I don’t feel like arguing over who has better hands.”

Kurenai actually laughed, “well as long as you’re self aware.”

Naminé smirked, “you’re talking to one of the best trauma surgeons in the country. Of course I’m self aware.”

“Does your back ever hurt having to support that big head of yours?”

Naminé laughed but quickly stopped when a resident with a beard and light blue scrubs walked over to them. She narrowed her eyes, trying to get a look at his badge.

“Dr. Sarutobi,” Naminé hummed, leaning back in her chair and crossing her arms, shooting Kurenai and all knowing smirk. “I don’t believe we’ve met yet.”

Dr. Sarutobi’s brown eyes landed on Naminé and gave her a cool smile, “we haven’t, but I’ve seen you around. You’re the Head of General and Trauma Surgery now. You definitely upset a couple of the attendings when you did that.”

“Not the only people I’ve upset since I got here,” she held out her hand and shook his with a firm grip, “I’m Dr. Naminé Nakano.”

“Asuma Sarutobi,” he said back, releasing her hand.

Naminé’s eyes flashed to Kurenai who was blushing intensely, trying to hide it behind chugging her water bottle.

“Dr. Sarutobi, I have to go check on some of my patients. Anyway you can keep Kurenai company?” Naminé stood up and was all too aware of the scowl that her friend was directing at her.

Asuma smirked at her, “I’d love to.”

Naminé winked at Kurenai and smiled at Asuma before she left the cafeteria with her coffee. She planned on going to her office to get some paperwork done, but decided that there was one patient she wanted to see before she did.

She headed to the surgical floor and went right to Kanna Otsutsuki’s room. The girl was alone, looking at the TV with a glazed over look on her face when Naminé walked in, but they came right back to reality at the sound of the door opening.

“How are you doing, Kanna?” Naminé asked, going straight for her chart to see what her vitals were like.

“I’m okay,” she said.

“I know you've seen a lot of doctors and nurses today. Do you remember me?” Naminé gave her a smile and set the chart back down.

Kanna smiled and nodded, “you’re the doctor who operated on me.”

“That would be correct,” Naminé moved a little closer, “how’s your head? I know Dr. Yakushi came down to look at you. She’s had you taken to get a bunch of scans, right?”

“Yeah,” Kanna said. She looked tired.

“How’s your stomach? Is it sore at all?” Naminé asked.

“Oh it’s sore,” Kanna laughed very softly and Naminé gave her a small but understanding smile. “But it’s okay.”

“Good,” Naminé straightened up. “I’ll let you relax. Try to get some sleep.”

Kanna thanked her as she walked out, and Naminé left to go to her office to get caught up on some of her paperwork before Chief Sarutobi fired her.

* * *

By the end of the day Naminé’s head was in a haze. She really shouldn’t even have been driving if she was being honest with herself. It was after midnight, her body ached from being in the OR for several hours when a trauma came in just before the end of her shift, and she knew that she was stupid and took too many pills for her back because she was getting drowsier than usual from them.

She initially humored the idea of sleeping in the on call room, but decided against it since she was off tomorrow. Plus, she didn’t feel like being woken up by a confused intern or getting caught by Chief Sarutobi in the morning. He would have yelled at her and told her to go home for going over her hourly work limit for the week, and then he would have been on her case for the rest of the next week for working too hard. She could have slept in her office, but the idea of sleeping on the floor was even less appealing than sleeping in the on call room.

So she was stuck driving home, struggling to keep her eyes open.

She yawned as she pulled into her driveway, feeling slightly less anxious than normal because of the haze in her head, and grabbed her work bag, ready to get out of her car when her eyes landed on the front door of her condo and she froze, immediately sobering back up.

The door was open.

Like wide open.

She stared at it for a long time, her mouth getting dry and palms getting sweaty. She pressed the lock button on her car door, despite knowing that the doors were already locked and just sat there dumbfounded.

Someone broke into her house.

No. Not someone.

 _Hidan_. Hidan broke into her house.

And for all she knew, he was still inside, waiting for her to walk in there so he could tie her up and kill her slowly, tasting her blood while he prayed to his god.

Naminé inhaled sharply and ripped her phone out of her bag and dialed Toka’s number.

It rang four times and then went to voicemail.

Naminé cursed and hit her steering wheel with her fists and looked at the time on her phone. It was one in the morning. Toka was probably asleep.

She cursed and went to call Kurenai, but then realized she didn’t actually have Kurenai’s phone number. For all their hanging out together and friendly banter, Naminé realized that she never bothered to get the woman’s number because as Kurenai said, Naminé was too goddamn scared to get close to anyone.

She looked back at the door of her home and sucked in another breath when she wore she saw movement in the doorway. She grinded her teeth hard enough to chip a tooth, and started the car back up, backing out of the driveway and speeding down the street to get away.

What the fuck was she supposed to do? She didn’t have any friends. She had Kurenai, and maybe if she reached hard enough, she was friendly with Kagami Uchiha, but she didn’t have either of their phone numbers. And Toka, the only person who actually knew what the hell was going on, wasn’t answering her phone.

Naminé sped through a yellow light, constantly looking in her rearview mirror to see if anyone was following her. And when she was a couple miles down the road, she pulled off to the side to get a hold of herself.

The only person aside from Toka who she could call was Hashirama. But it was so late and his wife was pregnant and the thought of calling them and dropping in unannounced after she so rudely left them today wasn’t something that sat well with her. Hashirama would take her in, without a doubt, but Naminé thought of the strain it might put on Mito and then rejected the idea without giving it anymore thought.

There was the hospital, but she couldn’t go back there. Not in the state she was in right now. And sure, Naminé was half decent at keeping herself composed, but not right now. And if her coworkers saw her acting funny and suspected something was going on, they would tell Chief Sarutobi and she couldn’t have that, not after he just wrote her a goddamn prescription for fucking _Percocet_.

She could sleep in her car.

But no. No she couldn’t. Hidan knew what car she drove and if he had already broken into it and now her house, she wouldn’t put it past him to find her car parked somewhere and break in while she was in it.

Naminé looked at her phone and her stomach sank as realization set in.

There _was_ someone she could call. Someone who would be awake and someone who didn’t have a pregnant wife to worry about and someone who didn’t know any of her coworkers.

She wanted to throw up.

But not seeing another option and in such a state of panic, Naminé picked up her phone and very slowly searched for his number and put the phone to her ear.

He probably wouldn’t answer, and if he did he would tell her to delete his number before he blocked her.

It rang once. Twice. Three times. Four…

And then right before it went to voicemail, he answered.

“Why are you calling me?” Tobirama deadpanned, not even greeting her.

Naminé actually sighed in relief and put her hand to her chest, as if that would help her heart from beating so fast that it exploded.

“Are you up?” She asked, almost panting and hoping she didn’t sound as hoarse as she thought she did.

“Yes,” Tobirama said, probably mentally scolding her for asking such a stupid question. Obviously he was awake if he was answering her phone call.

“Can I come over?” She blurted. There was never any point in beating around the bush with Tobirama, and she herself wasn’t put together enough to even attempt it.

“Why?” He asked.

Naminé locked her jaw and forcefully banged her head against the back of her seat, “look I’m sorry, okay? I know I said you would never have to see me again but this is a special circumstance and Toka won’t answer her goddamn phone and I don’t have Kurenai’s number a-and I can’t just wake up Hashirama! Mito is _pregnant_ for Christ’s sake! And I can’t go back to the hosp—”

“What’s wrong?” He asked, cutting off her frantic rambling. And for a second, she relaxed just a bit, because at least Tobirama was always steady when everything else was falling apart. If there was one thing he was good for, that was it.

“…Can I _please_ just come over? I’ll leave first thing in the morning. I just. I can’t. I really—”

He cut her off again when her voice cracked, “…okay.”

She closed her eyes and her free hand flew to her forehead as relief flooded through her veins.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

“I’ll send you my address,” he said. “Drive safely.”

Then he hung up and in another moment, her phone lit up with a text that had his address.

She looked around again to make sure she wasn’t being followed and put his address in her GPS and drove to his house.

Any haze that was making her drowsy before was long gone as she followed her phone’s directions. She needed to call the cops and she knew that well enough. But she was too scared to wait there for them to show up, and for all she knew no one actually broke in. There was always a chance she didn’t shut her door all the way and the wind blew it open (she doubted it though), and she didn’t want to look like an idiot if the cops showed up and nothing was wrong.

She would call them in the morning. That way when she had to go back to her house she at least had daylight on her side.

As it turned out, Tobirama lived only about ten minutes away from her. She held her breath as she pulled into the driveway of a small and pretty well secluded, but very modern house.

Naminé’s back twitched with pain as she grabbed her stuff and got out of her car and crossed her arms, looking over her shoulder every few steps. She walked past Tobirama’s car and went to the front door and knocked on it a few times, still looking over her shoulder. Every single tree looked like a figure waiting to grab her and Naminé picked at her fingernails, knocking on the door a second time.

The wind blew her hair along with the tree branches and in her frantic state, it sounded like footsteps, so she knocked much louder on the door and quicker, about to pick up the phone and yell at him to let her in.

But then the door opened and Tobirama was already glaring at her.

“I heard you, Woman,” he said.

She sidestepped him, taking one last look over her shoulder and stood in the entry way of his house. He looked at her over his own shoulder, looked outside for a moment with narrow eyes, and then shut the front door.

“Thanks for letting me stop by,” she said, hoping he wouldn’t chew her out too much.

Tobirama sighed and nodded, walking right by her without another word.

She pursed her lips and kicked her shoes off by the door and followed him as quietly as she could.

Where Hashirama’s house had been cozy and inviting, with warm tones, family pictures all over the place, and touches of Mito with her decorating, Tobirama’s was very clean and professional, as if no one actually lived there and the house was permanently staged by an interior designer. The walls were either white or grey, there were no photographs or paintings on the walls, and even the furniture of the living room was sleek and clean, with leather upholstery and neutral colors.

There was no television in his living room, but there were bookcases instead. She smiled softly to herself as she began to relax. Having books in place of a television was so painfully Tobirama that she couldn’t help but feel nostalgic.

“Do you want anything to drink?” He asked, gesturing for her to sit down on the sofa. She did and looked around the room again before answering.

“Tea would be nice,” she said, her voice still slightly shaky.

“I’m assuming you want green?” He asked, already turning away from her.

She cleared her throat, “that would be perfect.”

He left her as he went into the kitchen and she sucked in a breath, leaning her elbows on her knees and pushing her hair back. Who would have thought that this was where she ended up when things began to fall apart? She really had meant it when she said that he’d never have to see her again after he gave her back her scrub cap, despite how much it might have hurt. It was just easier if that was how things went.

But that was before Hidan broke into her house.

She relived the moment of pulling into her driveway and seeing the door open, and then she was rubbing her eyes and trying to breathe through the panic that was flooding through her once again. Moving back home was supposed to fix that area of her life that fell apart. Not make it worse.

How the hell was she supposed to know that he was going follow her?

She should have gotten Kurenai’s phone number weeks ago. Kurenai was the only new friend she made since moving back to the city, but no. Naminé couldn’t even get that right, because Kurenai was right. She had a crippling fear of getting close to people and this was her payment. Having to crawl to Tobirama for help and make his life worse because of it. It was like she was a glutton for self sabotage.

No wonder she picked trauma as her specialty.

Tobirama walked back out into the living room, holding a white mug out to her. She straightened up and accepted it with a quiet thanks and put the tea to her lips, immediately wincing when she swallowed.

“What? No sugar?” She asked, meeting his red eyes.

“I was not going to put seven teaspoons of sugar in there,” he said back as he crossed his arms. “There’s two. That’s more than enough.”

Naminé scoffed, “I’m down to four.”

“Of course you are,” he said, obviously not believing her and sitting at the other end of the couch, arms still crossed and stared her down.

Naminé looked over at him and her stomach twisted. He looked so tired, with dark circles under his eyes and his hair starting to grow out. He was probably buried in his work and not sleeping or eating because of it. The fact that he wasn’t withering away to nothing was shocking enough in itself.

“You haven’t been sleeping,” she said with a frown.

Tobirama didn’t even bat an eye, “neither have you.”

She narrowed her eyes, taking another sip of bitter tea and setting it down on the coffee table. She then turned so she faced him entirely and tried to hold that heavy gaze as best as she could, “I’m a surgeon. None of us sleep. What’s your excuse?”

There was a ghost of a smirk on his face, “running the entire legal department of Konoha Enterprises while we search for a new chief legal counsel.”

“Should have guessed it was something like that,” she muttered. “Your hair is getting long. You need to get it cut.”

Tobirama rolled his eyes, “haven’t had the time.”

“Oh I’m sure you have. You’re just too stubborn,” she said back.

He sighed, “are you going to tell me why you’re here or are you going to keep insulting me?”

“I was thinking of the latter,” she said, feeling a smirk on her lips. Tobirama pinched the bridge of his nose, probably fighting back the urge to kick her out for being a pain in the ass. She just couldn’t help herself. It was how she _always_ communicated with him, and she didn’t want to tell him about Hidan. She didn’t want to bother him with her problems. She just had no right to make him worry.

“You’re insufferable,” he said with an annoyed look on his face.

Naminé actually cracked a smile, “that’s my middle name.”

Then he stood up, “I thought your middle name was obnoxious.”

“I have two. I’m touched you remembered them both,” she remarked. Tobirama shook his head and disappeared from the living room, returning with a pillow and a throw blanket, tossing them on the end of the couch where he had just been sitting.

“I only get one pillow? That’s rude,” she said lightly, hoping he wasn’t still too upset with her.

But then his eyes were on her and he uncrossed his arms with a sigh, “that’s for me. You can sleep in the bed.”

Naminé’s eyebrows furrowed, “no way. I’m the one who barged into your house uninvited. Plus, you have bad shoulders. I’ll sleep on the couch.”

“Stop being difficult, Naminé.”

She glared at him and he glared back, crossing his arms once again. The amount of times in her life that she had walked up to him to forcefully uncross his arms all flashed before her eyes in less than a second, overwhelming her with the urge to do it right then and there. But she didn’t. She just tried to glare at him, knowing full well that she could never win against him in a staring match.

She crossed her own arms and tilted her chin upward, “make me.”

His eye twitched, “you are the most insufferable woman I have ever had the misfortune of meeting.”

She smirked at him, “so you’ve said.”

Tobirama huffed impatiently, “if you want to sleep out here fine, but you’ll have to tell me what happened if you do.”

Naminé scoffed, “trust me, you don’t want to know.”

Tobirama leaned against the wall and raised his eyebrows expectantly. He wasn’t going to budge and she knew that. So she rolled her eyes and muttered curses under her breath, picking up her work bag and scowling at him.

“Fine. But when you wake up with sore shoulders it’s not my fault.”

He actually smirked at her, just barely though, so that if you didn’t know him you wouldn’t have noticed. But Naminé did know him. She knew him like the back of her hand, so she caught it and her stomach did a tiny flip.

Pushing himself back up from the wall, he uncrossed his arms and put his hands in his pockets, walking ahead of her to show her where the bedroom was.

She followed him upstairs and they walked past an office and a library, explaining why there was only one bedroom, and when they reached the end of the hallway he opened the door, ushering her inside.

“There’s a bathroom in here, or you could use the one down the hall. I don’t care either way,” he stated. Naminé’s shoulder brushed past his chest when she walked into the room and she picked at her fingernails.

“Thanks,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

“Mm,” he hummed. “I’m going to sleep.”

He closed the door behind him as he left and she let out a breath when he did.

She walked further into the room, not being able to help herself with how curious she was. The walls were a light gray, the bed had dark blue linens on it, and the floor was spotless. The only furniture in his room was a dresser by the closet, a nightstand, and a small bookcase that had a mix of newspapers, books, and a few picture frames.

Naminé set her stuff down and walked right over to the bookcase and looked at the pictures. There was one of him and Hashirama, each in a suit and tie, standing next to each other for some work function. Hashirama had a big grin on his face and even Tobirama was smiling, just barely, but enough for it to be noticeable. She let herself smile as she looked at the other photographs.

There was one of his mother and father on their wedding day, one that she had seen countless times. Another of him and Hashirama on what looked like Hashirama’s wedding day, and then…

Naminé’s heart fell when she saw the other picture, and she picked up the frame, rubbing her thumb against it.

It was one of the four Senju brothers. Naminé sighed sadly when she thought of Kawarama and Itama. Hashirama was laughing with Itama in the picture, while Kawarama had an arm thrown around Tobirama’s neck with a grin as Tobirama glared at him.

She set the photo back on the bookshelf and peeled her sweatshirt off, tossing it on the end of the bed. The exhaustion from earlier swept over her from head to toe, and she couldn’t fight back the yawn.

So she walked over to the side of the bed furthest from the door and lied down, her eyes fluttering shut the minute her head hit the pillow.

Her mind swam with old nostalgic memories as she breathed. The smell of Tobirama’s deodorant and cologne blocked any thoughts of figures in dark alleys or pain in her back because without really even realizing it, she was back in a simpler time. Before she ever was pulled into an alley, before she ever cracked a chest in the ED, before she ever became an attending or a fellow, before she ever moved, before she operated for the first time, before she even started her intern year.

She rolled onto her side and wrapped her arms around one of the pillows and buried her face in it, breathing in deeply before she passed out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I decorated for Halloween today and since I'm feeling nice and festive I decided to update early! Next chapter should be out around Monday or Tuesday.
> 
> Leave your thoughts in the comments!


	6. Chapter 6

It was the sun that woke her up from the first peaceful sleep she had in months. Naminé squeezed her eyes shut against the light and burrowed deeper into the pillows and blankets, more comfortable than she could have hoped for. But the damn sun was shining directly onto her face and she couldn’t avoid it unless she smothered herself.

She huffed and sat up, grabbing her phone to check the time. It was only seven-thirty, and she considered going back to sleep, but then guilt crept through her gut when she remembered where she was.

So she got up, her feet hitting the cold wooden floor, and padded to the bathroom. She didn’t have a spare change of clothes with her unless she wanted to put on her scrubs, and she didn’t want to do that. Not when there was probably blood on them. So she would just have to make do in her leggings and t-shirt.

Wincing when she saw her reflection, Naminé tried to wet her hair down. That was one of the downsides to having short hair. It stuck up in every direction when she woke up in the morning.

Eventually she tamed it as much as she could, and she went back into the bedroom and made the bed and grabbed her stuff, heading downstairs to go… Somewhere. She didn’t know where yet. She just knew she couldn’t stay.

She heard noise from the kitchen, and walked in to see Tobirama sitting at the table with his laptop open and a cup of coffee beside him.

He wasn’t in a suit, still in sweatpants and a black long sleeved shirt from the night before, his hair was still a bit of mess from sleeping, and he had a pair of glasses on as his tired eyes read something on the computer.

“Did you sleep at all?” She asked.

He didn’t seem at all surprised to find her standing in the threshold of the doorway. In fact, he didn’t even look at her when responded, “a bit.”

“Oh so two hours?” She said back.

His eyes shifted up from his computer screen to her, “and you did better than that?”

Not seeing any harm in doing so, Naminé set her stuff down on the counter and sat down across from him at the kitchen table, pushing her shoulders back and holding her chin up in a defiant manner, “as a matter of fact I did.”

“Surprising,” he said, going back to his laptop. Naminé looked around the kitchen. It was clean, modern, and sparse, just like she expected.

“Would it kill you to make your home a little more… Homey? I mean really. It looks like it’s been staged by an interior designer,” she said, sneaking a glance at where he was rolling his eyes.

“I haven’t even been up for an hour and you’re already giving me a hard time,” he muttered.

“That’s what I do. I give people a hard time,” she remarked.

His eyes met hers again, “I know.”

She looked down and picked at her nails when her fingertips itched. That was when she heard him push his chair out from the table, and she watched as he walked over to the coffee pot and grabbed a mug and filled it. She really should have left by now.

But then he was in front of her, offering a cup of coffee.

“Thanks,” she said softly as she accepted it.

She put the cup to her lips, expecting the coffee to be bitter to taste, but it wasn’t. It was disgustingly sweet, just how she liked it, and her eyes flickered to where Tobirama was sitting back down across from her with his arms crossed, watching her with an even expression.

“You said you were down to four teaspoons.”

She held back a smile, “I am.”

He shrugged, “still going to rot your teeth.”

“I already have,” she said, taking another drink of the coffee and setting it down, twiddling her fingers in her lap.

“How many fillings are you up to now?” He asked, taking his glasses off and rubbing his eyes.

“Eleven,” she admitted, waiting for the arrogant, _‘I told you so’_.

She was downright blown away when a soft chuckle came from him instead, “not as many as I thought.”

She smirked in spite of herself and took another drink, not really sure of what else to say or do. But even though she was still a bit on edge, there was a familiarity of it all that was comforting. And she would take that where she could get it.

“I should get going. You have to go to work,” she said as she cleared her throat.

She could have been a mile away and still felt his gaze on her. Naminé looked away from the floor and looked up at where his eyes were focused solely on her. She couldn’t read his expression, but he didn’t seem annoyed or mad or even eager for her to go. He just seemed disinterested, but then again, when did Tobirama not look like that?

“You don’t?” He asked.

“I had to take today off since I already hit eighty hours this pay period,” she said.

Tobirama actually looked impressed, “and Hashirama says I’m the workaholic.”

She chuckled, “because you are.”

A ghost of a smirk appeared on his face, but then it was gone as quick as it appeared. “Since you’re off where are you going to go?”

She frowned, “what do you mean?”

He leaned back and crossed his arms once again, drawing her attention to the broadness of his shoulders that she knew were probably sore from his night on the couch. “You came here at one in the morning, scared to death, and desperate for a place to go. I’m assuming there’s a reason you didn’t want to go home. And since you’ve been kicked out of the hospital because of your hours, you can’t go there. So where are you going to go then?”

 She bit down on the inside of her cheek, feeling sick to her stomach.

“I can always go to the hospital even if I’m not working. I’ll just hide in my office.”

“And how long can you do that until you need a change of clothes?” Her eyes flashed to where he was casually drinking coffee while he grilled her. Her jaw locked when she felt a glare settle over her.

“Stop interrogating me, Tobirama.”

“I’m just asking questions, Naminé.”

She pursed her lips to keep her temper in check, not wanting to start a fight first thing in the morning. Especially not after he had just given her a place to stay. She couldn’t do that.

“I’m not sure,” she admitted. “I need to call the police first and then I don’t know. I could always pack a bag and in live in the on call room at work. Why?”

He set his coffee down with a sigh, “I’m asking so I know whether or not I should expect frequent late night phone calls.”

Naminé took another sip of her coffee. Okay. So he wasn’t asking so he could reprimand her, or be condescending, or anything of the sort the way he might have done to her before she left. It just annoyed her a little bit how calm he always had to be. It was like Tobirama Senju had two settings. He could be calm or he could be standoffish. There generally wasn’t much of an in between.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have called you but I didn’t have anyone else.”

There was a quiet pause until he responded with a soft, “I know.”

Her chest tightened. Of course he knew. He was Tobirama for crying out loud. He knew her better than she even knew herself. She had just forgotten that tiny detail after nine years of separation.

“Thanks for letting me stay here,” she said softly, because she really did mean it, even if it hurt her own pride. But she knew the longer she stayed the more of a nuisance she became. “I’ll get going so you can get to work.” She took one last chug of her sweetened coffee and got up to place the mug in the sink. She grabbed her stuff and headed to the threshold of the doorway, but came to a stop when he said something.

“Do you want someone to come with you?”

She froze, chest tightening even more as a thousand thoughts ran through her head, “come with me where?”

He rolled his eyes, clearly agitated and said, “to your house to pick up whatever it is you need.”

She fiddled with the strap of her bag, “are you offering?”

“Yes,” he deadpanned.

And you know what? Damnit she knew better. She knew better than to accept it because in what world was it okay for her to accept his kindness—something the man was not known for—after what she did to him? In what world was it okay that in a moment of crisis he was the one she turned to? It didn’t matter that she didn’t have anyone else. The point was that she should never have reached out to him. But you know what? She was fucking scared goddamnit. So in that moment, standing in Tobirama’s kitchen without anyone around to play referee, she went against her better judgment because it was Tobirama, and she was always just a little weaker in her resolve when it came to him.

“…actually, I would.”

He nodded and stood up, closing his laptop.

“I’ll shower first and then we can go.”

* * *

When the two of them pulled up to Naminé’s condo, Tobirama immediately glowered at where he saw her front door wide open. No wonder she was so scared last night.

He drove, despite her protests. He didn’t particularly care though. Naminé was a horrible driver with a lead foot, and he didn’t need to take his life in his hands when the business he worked so hard to help build needed him right now.

He didn’t say anything when they got out. He didn’t need to. He could see that someone broke in and that she was one wrong word away from having a mental breakdown. So he kept quiet and followed her up the stairs to her open front door.

What Tobirama expected was to see everything in her house broken, rifled through, with most of her valuables missing.

But instead, the house was perfectly fine, albeit a little cold from the door being open all night.

To say that Naminé was tense where she stood beside him would be a gross understatement. She seemed to be holding her breath the whole time, all while she picked and picked and picked at her nails until they all started breaking.

He kept close by while she walked around and surveyed the house. For the hard time she gave him about his house looking like it was staged, her condo wasn’t much better. The place barely looked lived in, as there was a thin layer of dust on her coffee table in the living room, and on the counters of the kitchen. She probably only used the place to get caught up on her sleep when she was home from the hospital.

But when they got upstairs, he saw more of her touches on the place. There were white roses, albeit wilting ones, against one of the walls. Her degrees were on display in the hallway, a framed photo of her in full operating attire, grinning through her mask with some other doctors was hanging up as well, and right on the wall outside of her bedroom was her letter from when she matched into her surgical residency in med school, in a large frame.

He remembered the way she squealed and jumped and hugged every person in sight when she opened the letter on match day. And then he pushed the memory away when his chest tightened and when his head swam with happier thoughts from a former life.

Leave it to Naminé to have zero pictures of her family in her home, and to only have things related to her career on display.

But he couldn’t blame her. Not really. Her work ethic had always been on par with his own, and it was one of the many things he loved her for when they were together.

“I don’t understand,” she said finally as they walked into her room. “It looks like nothing has been touched.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” he responded as he watched her pull out a tote bag and start throwing clothes haphazardly into it from her dresser. She never folded her clothes, even her formal ones. He wasn’t surprised to see that it hadn’t changed in the last nine years.

“I’m just confused is all,” she mumbled. He waited in the room as she went into the master bathroom, casually looking at all the photographs and keepsakes. They were all items related to her medical career, such a stethoscope and an old hospital badge. The framed pictures weren’t much different either. Every single photograph was related to something medical, such as the one on her dresser that showed her shaking the hand of who he presumed was the Chief of Surgery at her former hospital.

But despite all the keepsakes and photographs, there was something lonely about all of it. There wasn’t one recurring person in any of her photographs. As far as he could tell, Naminé didn’t have any friends. Not even at her previous hospital.

It was a sharp contrast compared to when they were younger and when she had more friends than even Asami. Hell, she had seven bridesmaids when they were going to get married.

That was when he heard a sharp gasp from the bathroom and the sound of something falling to the floor.

Tobirama immediately entered the bathroom with wide eyes, not knowing what to find, but expecting the worst.

“Naminé?” He asked, his eyes landing on where she pressed herself against the bathroom wall with her hands covering her mouth and honey topaz eyes wide.

He turned his head to see what she was looking at and felt as if the wind had been knocked out of him.

** ‘JASHIN WILL BE PLEASED WHEN I’M THROUGH WITH YOU’ **

It was written on the mirror in what had to be red lipstick, and displayed on the sink directly beneath it was what appeared to be a photograph.

Tobirama scowled and picked it up, his stomach twisting uncomfortably when he saw it was a picture of Naminé at work, sitting with a woman in the hospital cafeteria, very clearly unaware of her photo being taken.

“This is why you needed a criminal attorney,” he said, more to himself and less to the woman behind him.

He craned his neck over his shoulder and saw her trembling, her eyes pressed shut and holding her head.

Tobirama didn’t know how to explain the way he felt. To hell with how upset he was with her for what transpired between them years ago. He was pissed at whoever the hell did this. He was downright livid at whoever thought they could stalk a woman and break into her home like this. And he was even angrier at the fact that it had been Naminé of all people. Naminé, a woman who only wanted to help people. Forget the history between just the two of them. Tobirama grew up with this woman, Hashirama grew up with this woman, _his late brothers_ grew up with this woman… And the thought of someone trying to hurt her?

He was fucking furious.

“Finish packing your things, you’re staying with me for a while.”

“It’s fine. I’ll just stay at the hospital,” her voice cracked as she spoke and Tobirama couldn’t help it when he glared at her. He wasn’t upset with _her_. He was upset with the whole goddamn situation.

“Naminé, for once don’t argue with me.”

She pulled her hands away from her head and her bloodshot eyes opened as she sniffled. She didn’t argue though. She just nodded.

“Okay,” she whispered, running her horribly shuddering fingers through her short hair.

“I’m calling the police,” he said, his eyes honed in on where she slowly moved away from where she had been pressed to the wall and began to rifle through her drawers and medicine cabinet. She didn’t say anything to him, so he gave her her space and walked out of the bathroom and bedroom, wasting no time calling the police.

* * *

Naminé sat in the bathtub, her knees pulled to her chest and arms wrapped around them as water cascaded down on her from the showerhead. She tried to take a shower as a way of restarting her day, but the stress mixed with the pain in her back and the few too many painkillers she took made her lightheaded. So she ended up just sitting down in the middle of her shower so she didn’t fall asleep standing up.

When the cops showed up they took a report and labeled it breaking and entering, but that was about it. She told them that she knew who did it and that she was in the middle of a lawsuit with the man, but a lot of good that did her. They basically told her to be extra careful and that they would ‘look into it’.

She packed a bag with enough clothes for several days, and then Tobirama drove her back to his place before he went to work.

So here she was now, wasting hot water and just sitting in a bathtub while water showered her from above, trying to clear the fog from her head.

The only way to really do that though would be to sleep. Plus, she wasn’t sure if she wanted to be awake anyway. If the house creaked at all she was bound to freak out, so sleeping would just be easier.

She braced her hands on the side of the tub to hoist herself up. But that was when her eyes caught sight of the warped scars on the upper part of her thighs, and then her eyes drifted to the scars that disfigured her stomach and parts of her chest, and then her arms buckled and she collapsed back into the tub, her legs slipping out from under her.

Leave it to Tobirama to not have a fucking bath mat in the spare bathroom.

She groaned in pain, touching her lower back. She couldn’t take another Percocet, no matter how badly she might have wanted to. She would have been out of her goddamn mind if she did. She could barely keep her eyes open in her current state, but taking another one? Well shit, she might as well just put herself in a drug induced coma.

Giving it a second attempt, she got up successfully this time and shut the shower off. She towel dried her hair and body, changing into a pair of leggings and long sleeved t-shirt that advertised a hospital sponsored 5k run that she participated in at her old job. She looked at herself in the mirror and frowned. She knew the dark circles under her eyes were something that just came with age and lack of sleep because of her profession, but did they have to be so big?

She shook her head and turned to leave but caught herself as a wave of dizziness swept over her.

“ _Shit_ ,” she hissed, holding her head and making a mental note to herself to not take so much goddamn Percocet at once again.

She needed to sleep it off. So she left her bag in the spare bathroom and walked down the hall, opting to go to the little library instead of the bedroom. She appreciated Tobirama letting her sleep in there last night, but sleeping in his bed made her feel funny and nostalgic and she didn’t want that. Not now at least.

And since the library had a little sofa in it, she figured why not? Plus, she doubted she’d be able to make the trek down the stairs safely with all the opiates clouding her system. So she walked over to the sofa and pretty much collapsed onto it without a pillow or blanket, and then just like that, she was knocked out cold.

* * *

Tobirama wasted no time calling Toka up on his way to the office, already pissed beyond belief. She knew about all of this and didn’t think that he had a right to know? Someone was trying to _kill_ Naminé for Christ’s sake. And Toka didn’t think to clue him in?

“Shouldn’t you be working?” Toka answered the phone, sounding uninterested as always.

“When were you going to tell me that Naminé had a stalker?” He asked, his hands clenching around the steering wheel.

“What?” Toka asked.

“Someone broke into her house last night.”

“ _What_?” Toka’s voice rose and he only glared harder.

“You better explain yourself because I’m the one who got a phone call after midnight and now I’m the one with a very frightened doctor at their house,” he pulled into the parking garage and grabbed his phone after he parked his car and got out, waiting for Toka’s explanation.

“She called you?” Toka muttered.

“Toka,” Tobirama growled.

He could hear her huff, “she shouldn’t have called you. She should have gone back to the hospital or called Hashirama. But she shouldn’t have called you.”

He was going to throw his phone across the parking garage. All he wanted were answers, and instead all he got was Toka complaining about how he was the one Naminé reached out to.

“I don’t care about that. Did you know?” He walked over to the elevator to take him from the parking garage to one of the top floors of the company’s headquarters.

“Yes,” Toka admitted and he shook his head in response, seething through his teeth. “And before you reprimand me for not telling you, she asked me to keep it between us. Not to mention, I did ask Hashirama to talk to her about staying with him. And if I’m being perfectly honest, there was— _is_ no reason for you specifically to know.”

His eyes focused on where the elevator floors ticked by, carrying him to the top floor as he tried to calm his temper.

“What exactly has this stalker done to her?” He asked, thinking about how nervous she looked when she showed up and the way she picked her nails until they almost bled.

“ _No_. I’m not telling you. If she wants to go against her better judgment and tell you herself that’s fine, but I won’t do it. You’ll get all impulsive and make a fool out of yourself and go on a rampage—which is what you have _always_ done when it comes to Naminé. Attorney-client privilege means I don’t have to tell you a damn thing.”

He scoffed but didn’t say anything because deep down he knew she was right. And _she_ knew that _he_ knew she was right.

“If my house wasn’t being renovated right now I would have you send her to me, but obviously I can’t take her in. So just send her to your brother. You are the last person on this planet that needs her in their house.”

His jaw clenched. He always liked Toka better than any of his other cousins because she was usually the most logical one of the bunch. She thought things through, never got too emotional, and generally had a good grasp of things. But he didn’t like being told what to do, not by anyone. Not by his father when he was alive, not by Hashirama, and certainly not by Toka. He understood where her concern was coming from, but this was pushing it a bit too far. He wasn’t a child anymore and he wasn’t some brokenhearted schoolgirl. He was a grown man who knew how to be civil with his ex.

“She doesn’t want to stay with him because she’s concerned about the strain it might put on Mito,” Tobirama muttered, stepping off at his floor and going to the makeshift office that he and Hashirama were stuck sharing.

Toka let out a very annoyed huff on the other end, “then make her sleep at the hospital, Tobirama. You shouldn’t have _any_ contact with that woman whatsoever.”

His jaw clenched tighter as he opened the door to his “office” where Hashirama was already set up with his computer and papers, looking over his shoulder to shoot him a smile but immediately stopping when he caught sight of his brother’s expression.

“I have to go. We’ll finish this discussion later,” Tobirama hissed, hanging up the phone.

“Uh, everything okay? You’re late,” Hashirama said, his eyebrows rising with concern.

Tobirama sat down on the other side of the table and pulled his laptop out along with some forms for Financial Reporting and finally looked at his brother.

“Did Toka tell you why Naminé needed a criminal attorney?”

Hashirama actually looked genuinely confused and thrown off as his eyes narrowed and cocked his head to the side ever so slightly, “no. She didn’t tell me why Naminé should stay with me and Mito either. We even offered it to her yesterday during Mito’s checkup, but she got all twitchy and evasive and then she left and didn’t come back. Why? Do you know something?”

“She called me last night in a panic asking if she could come over,” he started, trying to ignore the way his brother’s eyes widened and the way his mouth slowly began to curl into a smile.

“You let her, right?” Hashirama pressed.

“Yes,” Tobirama said through his teeth. “She spent the night and I took her to her condo this morning. Someone broke in and then left some sort of threat on her bathroom mirror.”

The smile fell right off Hashirama’s face and his brow furrowed as a crease appeared in his forehead.

“No. No Toka didn’t mention anything… Why would someone do that?” Hashirama asked quietly.

“Naminé didn’t tell me anything. I only heard her mention to the police that she had a stalker but I didn’t hear anything else,” he said. His chest tightened and his fists clenched, getting angry all over again.

“Where is she now? She can’t stay at her place, it’s not safe—”

“She’s at my house,” Tobirama said before Hashirama could go on any further.

Hashirama was giving him a smirk again and Tobirama blatantly ignored it. He didn’t want to hear it.

“Well I’m glad she’s safe for right now, but where is she going to stay for the time being? It’s obviously not safe if her stalker was able to break in,” Hashirama said, frowning with concern again.

Tobirama crossed his arms, “it’s up to her. I told her she could stay with me, but if she’d rather go to the hospital or somewhere else it’s her decision.”

He risked a look at his brother, and he could tell that Hashirama was trying damn hard not to smirk, though was failing terribly.

“Stop that,” Tobirama warned.

“Stop what?” Hashirama pursed his lips tight together, still trying not to smirk.

“Looking at me like that.”

“I’m not!” Hashirama said, now not even bothering to hide his smirk. “I just think that it’s nice you’re letting her stay with you. And I think it’s even nicer that you two are on such good terms that she completely ignored my offer and took you up on yours.”

Tobirama’s eyes almost rolled all the way back in his head. There was no offer for Naminé to take him up on because he didn’t make any offer, but there was no point in telling Hashirama that after he already made his mind up.

He only offered her a place to stay because of their history. That was it.

“She didn’t want to call you because she was concerned about possibly putting strain on Mito,” he deadpanned, feeling tension in his shoulders.

Hashirama gave him a dismissive wave, “it would be no trouble.”

Tobirama raised an eyebrow, “all right. I’ll let her know then and send her your way.”

“Oh no,” Hashirama said back right away. “She’d probably be much more comfortable with you than with us.”

Tobirama’s lip began to curl, “why?”

“For multiple reasons,” his brother remarked. “There’s baby stuff all over the house, the guest room is being converted into a nursery, the office is being converted into a guest room, and we’re baby proofing the whole place already. The mess would drive Naminé absolutely insane.”

Tobirama knew that the excuses were Hashirama’s way of pushing him and Naminé together, but he had to at least agree with the last point. Naminé was absolutely neurotic when it came to messes. Tobirama was pretty neat himself, but when he got overwhelmed with work he got a little messy, leaving clothes on the floor and work papers all over the house. It used to drive the woman insane and she would follow him around their apartment at the time, picking up after him as she angrily muttered under her breath.

Despite knowing his brother’s excuses were bullshit, he’d give him that last point. The mess would have without a doubt stressed her out.

“I’ll still mention the option,” Tobirama conceded.

“Make sure you mention the clutter,” Hashirama said with a grin.

Tobirama sighed and ignored his brother, trying to distract himself with answering emails and working in relative silence, thankful when Hashirama got the hint and didn’t press the subject anymore.

The rest of the day pretty much followed suit. Hashirama didn’t bring up Naminé, but he occasionally smirked at Tobirama, which Tobirama was careful to ignore. They did their work in relative silence, only occasionally bringing something up when it involved needing both of their signatures or input.

But before Tobirama knew it, it was past six and Hashirama was standing up with a yawn, packing up his laptop and other things.

“I’m gonna call it a night. Mito is probably mad I stayed this late,” Hashirama said with a chuckle. Tobirama nodded but didn’t look up from the lawsuit one of the members of the legal department sent him. But when he noticed Hashirama in his peripherals staring him down, he paused his work.

“Is something wrong?” Tobirama asked, narrowing his eyes and looking at his brother.

“Maybe staying here until eleven at night isn’t the best idea when you have a very nervous woman at your house right now. Somehow I don’t think she’d be comfortable with you coming home at midnight.”

Tobirama scoffed, “Naminé is a grown woman. She’ll be fine.”

“Right. She has no reason to think that her stalker might have stalked her to your house and is trying to get to her when she’s alone at night,” Hashirama retorted, his voice dripping with sarcasm. He wasn’t smiling or even holding back a smirk, he was actually glaring at where Tobirama was trying to work.

“That’s ridiculous,” Tobirama said.

“Is it? The guy broke into her house. He clearly is not mentally stable—and your house is practically in the middle of a forest. Nothing creepy about it at all.”

“My house is not in the middle of a forest,” Tobirama remarked, but already feeling a little guilty. With the seasons changing it was getting darker and darker earlier. So despite the fact that it was only six-thirty, it was already almost pitch black outside, and he knew that couldn’t possibly have helped Naminé’s nerves.

Hashirama groaned and pinched the bridge of his nose, “that wasn’t the point I was trying to make.”

Tobirama could feel the scowl on his face as he regarded his brother, “I’ll leave here around ten.”

His brother actually looked like he was in pain with the way he threw his hands up and stared at the ceiling in disbelief, “would you please just go home? You can do all of your work virtually. Give _me_ peace of mind by giving _her_ peace of mind, please.”

Tobirama really didn’t want to start an argument with his brother, so he begrudgingly responded with a tight, “…fine.”

“Thank you!” Hashirama said, smiling once again.

So Tobirama packed up his stuff and walked with his brother out to the parking garage, saying goodnight to him when they went separate ways.

He drove home, still mentally going over all of the work he had to do. It would have been so much easier to just stay at the office late. In fact, he had every intention of being there as late as possible since he came in late in the morning, but even as much as he hated to admit it, Hashirama had a bit of a point.

But in all honesty, he wasn’t expecting Naminé to still be at his house. If anything, he would have guessed she went back to the hospital. So it was a bit of an understatement to say that he was surprised when he pulled in the driveway to see her car still there.

He entered the house, rolling out his shoulders and going straight to the kitchen so he could set up his computer and get work done at the table in there.

“What is this?” he asked when he walked in the room and saw dinner on the table.

Naminé, who leaning against the counter, shrugged in response, “it’s me being a gracious houseguest.”

His narrowed his eyes at her, wondering if there was some sort of ulterior motive. It wasn’t that preparing dinner was a gesture too nice for the woman to perform, but rather something the woman couldn’t actually do.

“Am I to believe you cooked this?” He asked, still watching her.

She rolled her eyes, “would you believe me if I said yes?”

He set his stuff down on the island in the kitchen and sighed as he sat down at the table. He was hungry, especially since he didn’t take a lunch break earlier in the day.

“No,” he said.

Naminé sat down across from him, “well good because I didn’t.” Her eyes flickered up to meet his across the table as she gave him a small smile, “you know I can’t cook.”

He kept the smirk that was threatening to make an appearance at bay, and instead focused on the dinner, which was a meal of salmon with vegetables. He didn’t bother asking where she ordered it from, but he appreciated it nonetheless, otherwise he wouldn’t have eaten anything all day.

They ate in comfortable silence and when they finished Naminé got up to do the dishes.

“I can do them,” he tried.

“I’m trying to be nice. Would you just let me?”

Tobirama frowned but didn’t argue with her. He had too much work to get through anyway. So he let her clean up and set up his computer, getting right to work. He still hadn’t finished going over that packet Hashirama gave him for financial reporting. So he answered a few emails and went over to his briefcase to retrieve the document and began going over it.

“Say what you will about me being the workaholic. At least I don’t bring my work home with me,” Naminé’s voice broke both the silence and Tobirama’s concentration, resulting in him looking up to glare at where she leaned against the sink wearing a smirk. He really shouldn’t have taken the bait. She was just being smug because she knew that was the quickest way to get a reaction out of him.

“Don’t patronize me.”

She gave him a smug grin, “I would never.”

He should have stayed at the office rather than subject himself to Naminé’s sarcasm. He must have been a masochist to actually let his brother convince him in to going back home to deal with her.

“Hashirama wanted me to let you know that you can stay with him if you’d like,” he said, trying to take control of the conversation.

Naminé pursed her lips in thought, “don’t want me staying here, Tobirama? That’s rude considering that I just prepared dinner for you.”

It absolutely pissed him off to no end that her stupid little comment and the sarcastic little tone bothered him as much as it did.

“Did I say that?” He asked, intent on keeping his voice low.

She knew she was getting to him because she was smirking now, “well you implied it.”

He gave her a harsh glare, “don’t put words in my mouth.”

He went back to the document at hand, carefully ignoring her. He wasn’t a teenager or in his early twenties anymore. He had better control of his temper and wouldn’t give Naminé a reaction just because she wanted one—just because she liked the fact that she was one of the few people who could get a reaction out of him.

“I know they wouldn’t mind if I stayed with them, but I don’t want to put any stress on Mito,” Naminé’s voice was soft when she spoke, having lost that sarcastic edge and using the softness in her tone to soothe his temper.

“I know,” he said, still refusing to look at her.

It was quiet again for a few moments, but even though he was looking at the document in his hands, he wasn’t reading it. The air between them just felt like there was something unfinished in it.

“So since I have to leave at five in the morning, I’ll be sleeping on the couch tonight,” she said, still using that softer voice. Tobirama sigh and rubbed his eyes.

“No,” he said, still not looking at her.

“Why?” She pressed.

“You have a bad back,” he said. The whole reason he had her sleep upstairs last night was because of her back. He knew that her pain probably eased up over the last nine years, but he also knew that breaking your back in three places wasn’t something you could just get over. And with Naminé’s profession, constantly being on her feet all day and running around, he didn’t want her to end up with even worse back pain because she was sleeping on a couch.

“You have bad shoulders,” she said.

He narrowed his eyes, finally looking at her. The fact that he had sore shoulders was because he slept on his stomach and tossed and turned all night, not because of some traumatic injury. It was a stupid point.

“You broke your back in three places,” he deadpanned.

She scoffed, “over ten years ago.”

He clenched his jaw unbearably tight. He couldn’t say what he really wanted to say regarding her back pain because it would have resulted in a nasty fight, one that they had the last time they saw each other all those years ago, and he didn’t want to bring up those old demons.

“I don’t care. You’re sleeping upstairs,” he put his foot down with a cold stare.

“You know, if you just had a guest room this wouldn’t be an issue,” she retorted.

He didn’t even dignify that with a response.

She threw her hands up in frustration, “I don’t care. I feel bad so I’m sleeping on the couch. And if you have a problem with that then you’ll just have to pick me up and carry me up to bed.”

The instant the words left her mouth her cheeks were turning a dark shade of pink. She opened her mouth to most likely go back on her words, but she probably realized that it was better off to pretend that there was nothing suggestive about what she said, because she promptly closed her mouth and crossed her arms, holding her chin up in a defiant gesture.

Tobirama rolled his eyes.

“Fine. Sleep on the couch and wake up in pain. I don’t care,” he grumbled, trying to get back to work.

“Fine.”

He heard her footsteps leave the kitchen and he shook his head as he rubbed his temples.

She was the most insufferable woman he had ever met in his entire life.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lol I've got a headcanon where in modern AU's Tobirama's got glasses since he's working all the time ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
> 
> Also I'm low key really sorry if this chapter sucked?? I literally rewrote it three or four times and I just never liked it. So I'm sorry about that if it did lmao


	7. Chapter 7

Naminé sat in her office, messing around with her scrub cab at her desk. It was already noon and she should have been down in the cafeteria actually eating something that didn’t consist of refined white sugar, but she was currently being held up on the phone by a very angry criminal attorney and was stuck where she was.

“Shouldn’t this be a good thing? Doesn’t this give you more evidence in my case?” Naminé muttered.

“Let _me_ worry about the case,” Toka snapped.

“Well good because that’s what I hired you for.”

“Watch your tongue,” Toka warned, making Naminé rub her forehead in frustration. “I don’t understand why you felt the need to call Tobirama of all people when this happened.”

Naminé snorted, “I’m sorry I panicked because my psycho stalker _broke into my house_.”

“You’ve always had nerve, but you were never unkind. Staying with him is unkind and you know that,” Toka said.

“How?” Naminé bit back. “How is staying with a childhood friend unkind? He’s a Senju for Christ’s sake. Just like you. Just like Hashirama. I mean really, Toka. Have I not been an honorary Senju since I was five?”

“Well you would be a real Senju if you didn’t run away nine years ago,” Toka bit back, not missing a beat.

Naminé closed her eyes, clenching her fist around her scrub cap. She knew Toka wasn’t going to forgive her for what happened, but Naminé had forgotten just how unrelenting Toka could be when one of her own was hurt.

“I don’t understand why you are latching onto this topic like a pit bull,” Naminé said very, very quietly. She knew that if she responded any louder then she would have entered a screaming match with Toka and she couldn’t do that. Not when she still so desperately needed the woman’s help.

“I’m latching onto this topic because you didn’t see the mess you left behind. I’m the one who had to clean up after you, just like I always have.”

That was a step too far because now Naminé was getting hot all over as anger pulsed through her body. The fucking nerve? Who did Toka think she was saying something like that? Naminé had cleaned up her fair share of Toka’s messes too when they were growing up. Hell, how many times did Naminé cover for Toka back in high school? Even in college? How many times did Naminé have Toka’s back when she got into trouble? She never thought anything of it because they were each other’s best friends, but to throw all of that back in Naminé’s face? Forget it.

“I don’t have to listen to this. Just do what I’m paying you to do, Toka. And while you’re doing that, I’m going to go do my job—the job where I _save lives_ ,” Naminé snapped, hanging up the phone and slamming it on her desk.

She bit down hard on her bottom lip and just sat there seething for a moment. When was the last time she had been so angry? She couldn’t remember.

She blamed it all on the goddamn Senju’s.

Checking the time on her watch and seeing that she still had plenty of time to run downstairs and grab something to eat, Naminé got up and shoved her scrub cap back into the pocket of her scrubs and walked out of her office.

That’s when she decided to stop by the surgical floor before going to grab something to eat.

Her body switched into autopilot as she went straight to Kanna Otsutsuki’s room.

Naminé knocked twice and then entered to see Kanna in the hospital bed looking at the TV with puffy red eyes.

“Kanna?” Naminé asked gently, giving the girl a soft smile.

Kanna’s eyes shifted to Naminé and she sniffled, wiping at her eyes quickly, “sorry, Dr. Nakano, but my parents are downstairs getting coffee if you’re looking to talk to them about my surgery.”

Naminé couldn’t help the frown that came over her face as she moved further into the room, going straight for the girl’s chart.

“What do you mean surgery? I already operated on you, Hon.”

“I guess you weren’t around last night,” Kanna murmured.

Naminé’s eyes scanned over the chart and her stomach churned at the new information in there. Kanna’s gunshot wound was healing just fine, but her head? Apparently yesterday she started suffering from sudden horrific headaches and started having seizures? She read deeper in the chart and saw that after a CT scan that she was diagnosed with a subarachnoid hemorrhage and was scheduled for brain surgery later that day.

“Oh my God,” Naminé said, putting her hand to mouth in shock.

“Yeah,” Kanna said, and Naminé looked up when she heard the little hitch in the girl’s voice.

“You must have hit your head when you were shot,” Naminé said. That didn’t seem to pacify the girl and Naminé suddenly didn’t care about going to get something for lunch. What she cared about was her patient.

“They have to shave my hair off,” Kanna whimpered, her eyes filling with tears.

Naminé knew she might have been overstepping some boundaries, but she didn’t care. So she sat down on the edge of the girl’s bed and took her hand.

“It’ll grow back,” Naminé said softly, knowing that it probably did next to nothing to make her feel better. “And nowadays they make wigs that look so real. No one will ever be able to tell the difference.”

Kanna gave Naminé a bitter smile and wiped her eyes again, “why are you being so nice to me? Don’t you have things to do?”

Naminé shook her head, “nah, just some paperwork that I’m avoiding.” Kanna gave her that same bitter smile and Naminé continued. “And I’m being so nice because you’re my patient. It’s not every day I get a twelve-year-old gunshot victim.”

Kanna looked down and sniffled again, so Naminé nudged her shoulder and tacked on a quick, “it’s pretty badass actually.”

This time the girl graced her with a soft laugh and Naminé couldn’t help but smile, glad that she could at least get the girl to laugh a little bit.

“I’m gonna look so stupid around Ashura now,” Kanna said with a heavy sigh.

Naminé’s eyebrows shot up, “oh? Who’s Ashura?”

Kanna’s face began to turn red and she shook her head, “no one.”

Naminé gave her a grin, “just no one huh?”

“He’s just some boy in my class,” Kanna grumbled, averting her eyes away from Naminé.

Naminé hummed, “is he cute?”

Kanna pouted and crossed her arms, “I know what you’re trying to do and it’s not gonna work.”

“What am I trying to do?”

“Trying to get me to admit that I like him—which I don’t!”

Naminé couldn’t help but laugh, and she held her hands up in defeat, “I’m sorry. You caught me.” She grinned when Kanna laughed softly in spite of herself.

“It’s not funny!” Kanna said, even though the corners of her lips were pulling up into a smile. “You’re probably married. You don’t know what it’s like.”

Naminé feigned shocked, placing a hand over her chest, “uh incorrect.” Naminé held her hands up to Kanna, wiggling her fingers for extra effect. “Do you see a ring anywhere? Because I certainly don’t.”

The girl’s eyes narrowed as they swept over Naminé’s hands, “you’re not engaged or married or anything?”

“Nope,” Naminé said with ease. “It’s just me, myself, and I. Although I _am_ thinking about getting a goldfish. Makes the house a little more homey.”

Kanna let out a real laugh this time and shook her head, still giggling at where Naminé was grinning at her, “seriously? A goldfish?”

Naminé shrugged, “they’re less work than cats or dogs.”

“Maybe.”

“But you’re not going to need a goldfish. Once we get your head all cleaned up you’ll be a total catch,” Naminé winked at her.

Kanna gaped, “I’m not one now?”

Naminé chuckled under her breath, “I’d say you are, but you’re a catch with a brain bleed. Once that’s taken care of you’ll be a total dime. A ten out of ten.”

Kanna laughed softly and then she was looking directly into Naminé’s eyes, “are you going to be in there when they do the surgery?”

“Unfortunately no. That’s not my area of expertise,” she said with a sympathetic smile.

“So what’s your area then? Gunshots?” Kanna mumbled with a frown.

“Actually it is,” Naminé said. “Gunshots, stabbings, car accidents, falls. All of that horrible stuff.”

The girl’s eyes widened, “really?”

“Mhm.”

“You’re too pretty to be doing that,” Kanna said, narrowing her eyes and inspecting Naminé’s face after the words left her mouth.

“Well thank you,” Naminé said. “But it’s what I love.”

Kanna’s upper lip curled in disgust, “but you probably get blood on you all the time.”

Naminé laughed in response, “actually one time I got blood in my hair and it stained it for a couple days since I’m so blonde.”

Kanna looked absolutely horrified as her eyes widened, “that’s awful!”

“Dr. Nakano, do you have a second?” A new voice asked as the door opened. Naminé looked over her shoulder to see Kagami standing in the threshold of Kanna’s room. She nodded and turned her attention back to Kanna, her chest tightening when she noticed the smile falling from the girl’s face.

“I know it’s scary, but it’s really important you go into this surgery with a good attitude, okay?” Naminé said, holding the girl’s gaze with her own. “I mean it.”

“Okay,” Kanna said.

“I’ll stop by after to make sure you’re doing all right,” Naminé said, giving the girl a small smile in an attempt to ease the tension.

“I’d like that,” Kanna said.

“Me too. Now get some rest.”

Naminé left the room and quietly shut the door behind her, walking over to where Kagami was waiting for her by the nurses’ station.

“Dr. Uchiha, have you missed me? It’s been an entire shift since you’ve seen my lovely face,” Naminé said with a smirk when she approached the resident.

“Oh yeah. I was just aching with loneliness,” Kagami said, smirking back at her.

Naminé crossed her arms in amusement, “I didn’t know you could be so sassy.”

“I’ve spent too many shifts with you. It’s rubbing off,” he said, laughing under his breath. Naminé snickered as well and shrugged, a little surprised and a little impressed. “Since you’ve got a minute, I wanted to ask you if you’ve gotten the chance to talk to Chief Sarutobi about the fellowship? I know I asked you just the other day but I applied and well… Yeah.”

“No, I haven’t gotten the chance. But whenever I see him next I absolutely will. You’d make a great trauma fellow,” she said.

“Thanks. I’m sorry, I’m just a little nervous,” Kagami said as he rubbed the back of his neck.

“It’s not a problem,” Naminé assured. “Now I think I’m going to—”

“Dr. Nakano,” it was Kurenai, joining them at the nurses’ station, pulling her hair back into a ponytail. Naminé held back a sigh. So much for getting something to eat.

“Did you just come from lunch?” Naminé asked.

“Yeah, I had to come back because we had a code,” Kurenai said. “What are you doing tonight?”

Naminé narrowed her eyes, “nothing?”

“Of course you’re not doing anything, I don’t know why I asked,” Kurenai teased. Naminé opened her mouth to defend herself but the nurse kept going before she could even start, “A bunch of us are going out to the bar tonight. Wanna come?”

“Who’s a bunch of us?”

“Well some of my friends are going, but I know the residents usually go too,” Kurenai’s eyes flickered to Kagami who nodded.

“I’ll be there,” Kagami flashed Naminé a grin.

“What’s the special occasion?” Naminé asked curiously, leaning on her hip.

“It’s Friday,” Kurenai said with a laugh. “And not my weekend to work.”

“What about you? I doubt you’re off tomorrow,” Naminé asked Kagami. He shrugged and plunged his hands into the pockets of his white coat.

“I don’t come in until tomorrow night, so why not?”

“But I’m on call this weekend,” Naminé tried. She knew she was being weird about the whole thing, but ever since that one night out during her fellowship, she generally disliked bars. She just got all nervous and twitchy towards the end of the night when she had to leave.

“Aw c’mon. You know that on call for an attending is not the same thing as on call for a resident,” Kagami said quickly. “All you have to do this weekend is go home and try to stay sober in case some crazy trauma comes in. Come on. Live a little.”

Naminé laughed in spite of herself, “wow the resident is telling me that I need to have a life. How sad is that?”

“It’s pathetic,” Kurenai remarked with a smirk. “You need to get out. Maybe you’ll find some guy you can take home and then you’ll stop asking me questions about my sex life.”

“Uhm,” Kagami cleared his throat, fidgeting where he stood and awkwardly looked around. Naminé and Kurenai looked at each other and erupted into a fit of giggles.

“Aw Dr. Uchiha, you’re so cute,” Naminé said through her laughter.

“He is. Don’t you just wanna pinch his cheeks?” Kurenai snickered.

Naminé reached a hand up and pinched one of Kagami’s blushing cheeks causing him to squeak and swat her hand away.

“Okay I’ve had enough of you two,” he said, walking away from them.

The two of them just laughed until Kurenai finally got a hold of herself, “so I’ll take that as a yes to coming out.”

Naminé sighed but still smiled in spite of herself, “sure, why not?”

“Great. We’ll find you some guy and you’ll get off my case about Asuma.”

Naminé smirked, “not likely to happen.”

“Which part? Getting off my case or finding a guy?”

“Both,” Naminé said. “I’m sworn off men.”

Kurenai scoffed, “not if I have anything to do with it. You need to lighten up and drunken sex is the best way to do it. Just kick him out in the morning.”

Naminé snickered, “well I’m staying with someone right now, so no one will be coming home with me.” She didn’t miss the way Kurenai’s eyebrows knit together when she said it, so Naminé quickly shoved an excuse in there. “The pipes burst at my place so I can’t stay there.”

“So? Just sneak in,” Kurenai said, though by the way she was smirking Naminé could tell she didn’t really mean it.

But Naminé’s eyes widened nonetheless, “I’d be dead if I did that.”

“Well who are you staying with? Your parents?” Kurenai asked with her eyebrows furrowing in suspicion.

Naminé pursed her lips, “an old friend, and he would literally freak out. You can’t sneak anything past him.”

“Oh so it’s a man you’re staying with,” Kurenai gave her a dirty smirk and Naminé scoffed.

“Trust me, it’s not like that.”

“Why? Is he married or something?”

“No, it’s just… Complicated.”

Kurenai narrowed her eyes, continuing to smirk at her, “‘complicated’ is a nice way of saying he’s your ex.”

“ _Aaand_ we’re done here,” Naminé said. “I’m getting food before I pass out.”

But as luck would have it, that didn’t happen because her pager went off. Naminé threw her head back and groaned, looking at the message on it, telling her that she was needed to assist one of the residents in the OR.

It was fine. Not like she needed to eat or anything.

She would just eat when she was dead.

* * *

Toka poured over all the details of Naminé’s ongoing court case. It had been a battle to get all the documents from her previous attorney, but she managed it after countless hours of playing telephone tag and fighting via emails.

From what Toka could tell, the guy wanted to drag it out for as long as possible to get more money because he knew Naminé was a surgeon and had the funds to actually pay him. And that combined with how desperate Naminé was for the lawsuit to come to an end, he knew he could charge whatever he wanted, and Toka hated attorneys like that.

So now that she had effectively stolen his case, she read over every last paper and transcript from the pretrial that she had. The fact that Hidan wasn’t in prison was a failure of the justice system and Toka was determined to correct that.

The worst part of the whole thing though was looking over the evidence, and that included photographs of Naminé’s injuries.

Her face was beat up, there was blood in her ash blonde hair, but the worst were the cuts on her torso and legs. They were long swooping gashes that stretched from her ribs down to her lower stomach and there were even more on her thighs.

Toka had to look away after examining them.

It was just so hard to believe that it was Naminé this assault happened to.

Whenever Toka thought about Naminé over the last nine years, she pictured the woman one specific way. Whenever her childhood friend crossed her mind, she remembered Naminé’s long blonde hair pinned back in an intricate bun with pieces framing her face and her in a white wedding gown with lace adorning every detail of it. But despite how beautiful she looked, Toka remembered the look of distress on her face as she had her makeup done and the way she picked at her fingernails that were just manicured the day before.

Toka had been her maid of honor and asked her over and over again what was wrong, but Naminé swore she was fine as she kept biting on her lip. That was when she got up from where they were sitting as the other bridesmaids were getting their hair and makeup done, and rifled through a bag she brought with her.

Toka remembered being confused when Naminé got more and more flustered, eventually dumping everything in the bag out and ripping through everything she had. She was looking for something, but Toka didn’t know what, and to this day she still didn’t know.

Then Naminé, in the middle of a meltdown from not finding whatever it was she was looking for, insisted that she had to see Tobirama.

Everyone joked around and told her that it was bad luck for the bride to see the groom before the wedding, but Toka could tell that her friend was in the middle of completely losing it, so she called up Hashirama and they arranged for the two to meet.

She met with Tobirama, got in her car, and then left and never came back.

Then she was gone. Just like that.

Toka was still bitter about it, even after almost a decade. She even used to pester Tobirama about it, asking if he knew anything, but he just shut down whenever someone brought Naminé up and would become even harsher than usual.

The fact that her lifelong best friend had been having doubts, or going through something that would make her walk away from the only man she ever loved, would have been enough to bother anyone, but Toka was more upset because Naminé never confided in her. How had the girl she spent her whole life getting into trouble with not tell her when something was eating away at her so badly?

So when Naminé showed up at her law firm nine years later with short hair and hollow eyes, Toka was angry.

But then she sat back and listened to Naminé’s whole story, and she felt bad. She wanted to help, and she would, but she still couldn’t forgive her.

And looking at Naminé’s injuries only made her feel more vindicated, despite knowing that it was horrible for her to feel like that. If she had never left, none of this would have happened.

Toka would put Hidan in prison for doing what he did to her old friend. She could do that without a problem

But forgiving Naminé?

No. That was asking too much.

* * *

Having already changed out of her scrubs and into a pair of washed blue jeans and a black t-shirt, Naminé stopped by the surgical floor before she headed to the bar. She went to Kanna’s room, knocking a few times and opening the door to see Kanna fast asleep with her mother in a chair beside her bed.

“Can I help you?” Her mother asked. She had very dark circles under her eyes and just looked completely drained.

“I’m sorry, please excuse me for intruding. I’m Dr. Nakano,” Naminé held her hand out and shook the woman’s hand, her hand barely even gripping Naminé’s.

“Oh right,” she said in a hoarse voice. “You’re the doctor who operated on her after she was shot.” Her voice hitched when she spoke and Naminé gave her a sympathetic nod.

“That’s correct. I just wanted to see how your daughter was doing after her surgery today,” Naminé was sure to keep her voice quiet as not to disturb Kanna. She went for her chart to see how she was holding up and was relieved to see that everything seemed to have gone well.

“I’ll be sure to tell her that when she wakes up. She’s very fond of you, you know. I’m not sure what you said to her before surgery, but whatever it was it worked,” her mother said with a sad smile on her face.

Naminé paused and set the chart down, “I hope I didn’t overstep.”

She shook her head, “on the contrary, I’m glad you stopped by. She wouldn’t stop crying when we found out she needed surgery again. She was still scared right before, but at least she wasn’t crying.”

Naminé nodded, “well I’m glad I could help. I hope you’re able to get some rest tonight.”

The woman gave a barely audible thanks, and then Naminé left the room as quietly as possible and pulled out her phone, checking the text from Kurenai that told her where the bar was. She got the nurse’s number earlier on, and all Naminé could think was that she should have done that sooner so she didn’t have to go to Tobirama for help the other night. She wouldn’t have expected anything from Kurenai, other than maybe someone to just talk her off a cliff in a moment of panic, but even just having that and nothing else would have been infinitely easier than staying with cold, distant, Tobirama Senju.

He had been right of course when he told her not to sleep on the couch last night because of her back, but Naminé was too stubborn to admit that. So when she woke up in the morning, stiff as hell, she took a few pills and went off to work.

She appreciated the fact that he was letting her stay with him, she really did. But she hated the fact that she felt like she had to walk on eggshells around him. She tried to be casual around him, giving him sarcastic comments and pressing his buttons, because if she was being honest with herself, she did that to everyone, but it didn’t make things any easier. There was just too much tension between the two of them for that.

Not that she blamed him.

He was a better person than she was, because if their positions were reversed she wasn’t so sure if she would let him stay with her.

But then again, with the way she felt about him since she was a child she sort of doubted it.

She shook the thought from her head and went out to her car, looking over her shoulder the whole way. She didn’t see anyone lurking in the shadows or mistake a light post for a person, and sighed in relief as she started her car up and drove to the bar.

It was maybe a three minute drive, at most, from Hidden Leaf Hospital.

No wonder it was the place to be for any and all of her coworkers.

Naminé entered the bar and looked around for a minute, trying to figure out who all was there, but stopped when she saw Kurenai sipping on a pink cocktail.

“I was starting to think you weren’t going to show up,” Kurenai said when Naminé walked up to her. She gave the nurse a tired smile and let her attention drift back to scoping out the room.

“I was checking on a patient,” Naminé said.

“Your twelve-year-old who got shot?” Kurenai asked.

“Yeah. She needed brain surgery today,” Naminé dug around in her purse to pull out a packet of peanut M&M’s.

“I heard about that. She was having seizures yesterday… Do you ever eat real food?” Kurenai asked, eyeing Naminé’s candy.

“I haven’t eaten a goddamn thing all day and I’m starving. Lay off, yeah?” Naminé grumbled.

Kurenai snickered, “yikes. I haven’t seen you so cranky before.”

Naminé didn’t respond, still looking around the bar. She recognized several nurses from the surgical floor, along with a couple residents, and even the two interns Izumo Kamizuki and Kotetsu Hagane. And when she looked over to the pool table she saw the cardiothoracic attending Dr. Kito with Asami, trying to make a move on her.

“You want a drink?” Kurenai asked.

“Might as well.”

“With no food in your stomach you’ll be drunk in no time,” Kurenai teased as they both walked up to the bar. Naminé smirked at her, finishing her M&M’s before she got something to drink.

She shouldered herself between two people, nodding when the bartender saw her. She asked for just a beer and thanked him when she left a few bills on the bar.

“So where’s your sexy ortho resident, Kurenai?”

Kurenai shot her a look, “he’s on call tonight.”

“Too bad. I wanted to grill him,” Naminé said as she put the beer to her lips. Her eyes flickered back over to Asami and Kito. The woman was actually smiling as she played pool with a group of other doctors, and how the hell she looked so put together after an entire shift Naminé would never know, but she hated her a little bit for it.

“So you gonna tell me what your deal is with Dr. Matsuo?” Kurenai asked, following Naminé’s gaze to the neonatal surgeon.

Naminé looked away from the woman and instead focused on drinking her beer, “nope.”

“Of course not. Heaven forbid you share any of your secrets,” Kurenai remarked, elbowing Naminé in her side.

“My secrets keep me interesting,” Naminé said as she swatted her friend’s elbow away.

“I heard a rumor that you used to work at the hospital before and that you know the Sarutobi family, so that’s why you got the job as head of general and trauma surgery,” Kurenai said casually. “I also heard an even crazier one that you’re some runaway bride.”

Naminé’s eyes widened, “where the hell did you hear that?”

“I’m not saying she said it, but Dr. Matsuo loves everyone—everyone except you that is.”

Naminé actually felt her lip curl in disgust, “I got the job because I’m good at what I do. And yes, I did my intern year at the hospital and yes, I do know the Sarutobi family. But that is not why I got my position.”

“What about the runaway bride stuff?” Kurenai pressed.

Naminé snorted and downed like half her beer, “she’s got a lot of nerve telling people that.”

“Is it true?”

Naminé didn’t say anything, looking for anything to pull her away from the conversation.

“Holy shit it is, isn’t it?” Kurenai gasped.

“It’s irrelevant,” Naminé muttered. Why the hell couldn’t her pager go off at a time like this? You know, when she actually wanted it to go off?

“Well Dr. Nakano, you just got a hell of a lot more interesting.”

“Oh shut up,” Naminé grumbled, downing more of her beer. That was when her eyes landed on Kagami and she sighed in relief, grateful to steer the conversation away from her past. She grabbed Kurenai’s elbow and they walked over to where he stood with the two surgical interns.

“Dr. Nakano,” Kotetsu Hagane said with a nervous smile.

Naminé gave him a tight smile in acknowledgement and then looked at Kagami, “we didn’t scare you off, Dr. Uchiha?”

He looked at both her and Kurenai and gave a nervous laugh, “you don’t have to call me that outside of the hospital. Kagami works just fine. And no, you didn’t.”

“I think you and I are the only people in the whole hospital that Dr. Nakano hasn’t scared off yet,” Kurenai said, sipping on her drink innocently when Naminé glared at her.

She heard Kotetsu and Izumo snicker and Naminé shot them a scowl that had them both shutting up and excusing themselves.

“Probably,” Kagami said with a shrug.

They continued on with mild small talk, Naminé finishing her drink along with Kurenai, and went back to the bar to get seconds. When they returned to where they had been standing with Kagami, Dr. Kito walked over with a big grin on his face that gave away how much he had been drinking.

“Dr. Nakano, I don’t think I’ve seen you out here before.”

“That’s because it’s my first time,” Naminé said, putting her beer to her lips and drinking probably more than she should have at once.

“Well I’m glad you made it,” he said, his cheeks a little pink from the alcohol. “You never told me that you and Dr. Matsuo were childhood friends.”

Naminé’s eyes immediately flickered to Asami at the pool table, watching them with her icy blue eyes. She turned her attention back to Kito and gave him one of her ultra professional smiles, “I don’t know if we were childhood friends, but we certainly grew up together.”

In his drunken state, he didn’t notice any hostility in her words, but clearly Kagami and Kurenai did, as they both tensed beside her.

“She was telling us some pretty funny stories about you two. Sounds like you were the life of the party back in your hey day.”

Naminé narrowed her eyes for a fraction of a second. What the hell did that mean?

“Excuse me?” Naminé asked, careful to keep her tone light.

“C’mon Nakano, he’s drunk,” Kurenai hissed.

“Oh no. You need to come over and hear for yourself,” Kito slung an arm around her shoulders and she immediately went stiff as a board as he dragged her across the room to the pool tables. Naminé shrugged him off when they got there and glared quickly at him and then at Asami.

“I hear you’re telling stories, Dr. Matsuo,” Naminé said with a voice that was sickening sweet. She knocked back most of her beer and didn’t even acknowledge Kurenai or Kagami when they reached her.

“Oh just harmless fun, Naminé,” Asami drawled, being disrespectful once again by calling her by her first name around their coworkers. “I was telling Kito about that time you got super drunk and tried to start a fight with one of the bar backs, and how Toka had to literally drag you out of the bar.”

Kito, along with his cardiothoracic fellow Kusushi, chuckled and Asami winked at her.

All right. If Asami wanted to play that game, fine. Naminé would play.

“Funny,” Naminé started, knowing full well that Kurenai was probably regretting having invited her out now. “Dr. Kito, did Dr. Matsuo ever tell you about that time she purposely spilled her drink on our dear friend’s date one night? And how it was all because she thought it was me?”

Kito erupted into laughter alongside Kusushi. But Asami definitely did not. She just stared Naminé down as Naminé casually drank from her beer.

“Well you can’t blame me. I was under the impression that Naminé was cheating on our friend’s brother,” Asami remarked, batting her eyelashes and sipping on some fruity cocktail.

“Oh of course, because all blondes look alike,” Naminé said. “You know, you never told me why you did that in the first place.”

“Nakano,” Kurenai hissed, probably trying to end this before it got too ugly. But even though Naminé was only about two beers deep, her head was already starting to get a little fuzzy since she drank them both so fast and since she had absolutely nothing in her stomach.

She blamed her behavior on beer muscles.

“Just trying to look out for a friend,” Asami said, glaring directly at Naminé now and not even trying to hide behind her pretty face.

“Did you think he was going to fall into bed with you if you were right?” Naminé deadpanned, cocking her head to the side and pouting her lower lip for extra effect.

“Christ, Dr. Nakano,” Kagami whispered, sounding completely mortified.

“I’m sorry?” Asami’s voice was tight when she said it, and Naminé was acutely aware of how even in his drunken state, Kito was starting to notice the tension between them as well.

“Well that’s what you wanted, right? Tell him that I was cheating and then have him turn to you for a shoulder to cry on? You always hated that he never wanted you and wanted me instead.”

Asami was quick when she responded, not missing a single beat, “well a lot of good it did him. I don’t see a ring on your finger, Naminé.”

Despite the noise from the bar, Naminé swore that she could have heard a pin drop. And if she wasn’t in the middle of a lawsuit right now and needed a squeaky clean record for it, Naminé would have grabbed the 8 ball from the pool table and beat Asami over the head with it.

“Dr. Nakano, I need another drink. How about you come with me?” Kagami, sweet innocent Kagami, cut in by putting a hand between her shoulders and pulling her away from Asami and both of the cardiothoracic surgeons.

“What the hell was that?” Kurenai snapped when they were out of hearing range.

Naminé chugged the last little bit of her beer, her entire body just on fire with how pissed off she was.

“Nothing,” she said.

“Remind me to never get on your bad side,” Kagami said under his breath.

Naminé sighed and looked at the resident, cooling off just a bit.

“I’m sorry you had to see that,” she muttered as she put her glass down. “The two of us have never gotten along.”

“How ‘bout it, Kagami? She scare you off yet? Because she almost scared me off,” Kurenai said nonchalantly, though she didn’t fool Naminé. Naminé knew damn well that Kurenai was just as uncomfortable as the rest of them.

“Not quite,” Kagami said with a shrug. “I need her to be on my side for my fellowship anyway.”

“That’s the spirit,” Naminé said, though her heart wasn’t in it. Once her anger started to dissipate she got a little embarrassed. She shouldn’t have acted like that in front of her peers, Asami or no Asami. So she excused herself and went over to the bar to get one last drink, and then decided that she would head out since she already made a complete fool out of herself.

Kagami and Kurenai grabbed a little table and Naminé joined them, already sipping her beer and wishing she was someplace else.

“You knock those back fast,” Kurenai said with a chuckle.

“It’s my addictive personality. I can never have just one of anything,” Naminé deflected.

“It scares me to think what you were like as a resident if that’s your attitude,” Kagami said with a smile.

Naminé smirked at him, “let’s just say I always got the best surgeries.”

“I’m sure you did because you’re too goddamn ruthless otherwise,” Kurenai laughed under her breath. “I can only imagine this guy you and Dr. Matsuo were fighting about. He had to be a total pushover to put up with you. Otherwise you’d probably kill him.”

Naminé almost laughed at the thought of someone calling Tobirama Senju a pushover, “let’s just say he makes me look warm and fuzzy.”

“Scary,” Kagami mumbled into his drink.

Kurenai and Naminé actually both erupted into laughter, more from the alcohol and surprise of Kagami being the one saying it than anything else. He was usually so well mannered that when he got sarcastic it was just downright funny to hear.

Things were lighter after that and Naminé only felt a little embarrassed. Kagami promised her that people had done a lot stupider things before and Kurenai agreed. So it was easier to relax, but then of course Kito had stop over with Kusushi, the two of them holding shots and wearing nervous smiles.

“Peace offering?” Kito asked as he and the fellow handed the three of them shots.

“Well I’m not gonna turn down a free shot,” Kurenai said with a smirk.

“I should be the one buying you a shot. I’m sorry,” Naminé immediately apologized. Kito had no way of knowing things would get so ugly. Plus, he was drunk and was just trying to share some funny stories with his peers. How was he supposed to know that Asami and Naminé had been enemies since childhood?

“Well you can take this one first and then buy us one,” Kusushi suggested.

Naminé looked at the shot, not sure of what it was, but figuring it was probably vodka since it was clear.

“C’mon, Dr. Nakano. Let’s do shots while we’re free from Chief Sarutobi,” Kagami urged with a big grin on his face.

“Yeah, Doc. Give in to peer pressure,” Kurenai said with a giggle, having already taken hers.

Naminé sighed. What was the worst that could happen?

She took the shot, cringing as it went down along with the rest of her coworkers, and then Kito and Kusushi were grinning at her.

“Your turn to buy?” Kusushi asked.

“It’s that addictive personality, you can never have just one,” Kurenai teased.

Naminé laughed but shrugged. Why not?

So she went up to the bar and bought another round of shots.

* * *

Tobirama was not worried. No. Not at all.

Naminé was a grown woman and had a job that often resulted in sixteen hour shifts. So despite the fact that it was already midnight and despite the fact that she hadn’t come back didn’t bother him at all.

He just thought it was rude. To be a houseguest and come back extremely late without even so much as a text to inform the host of your whereabouts was just discourteous.

So no. He wasn’t worried. He was just annoyed.

But he supposed he could use the quiet. He himself got back from Konoha Enterprises only after nine, and used the time since then to continue to work. And it was much easier without a snarky woman giving him her two cents every opportunity she got.

He continued to pour over legal documents, despite the strain in his eyes that not even his glasses or Tylenol helped to dispel. The sooner they could hire a chief legal counsel the better, but until then Tobirama was going to be stuck doing the work himself.

Then his doorbell rang?

He frowned and looked at the time on his computer. It was a little past midnight, and the only person it could have been was Naminé.

But he showed her where the spare key was, so why the hell did she feel the need to ring the doorbell?

Already glaring, Tobirama removed his glasses and walked through his house to open the front door.

Instead of Naminé glaring at him, bitching about how she couldn’t find the spare key or something, he was greeted with Naminé, and two other people, a man and a woman, that he had never seen before in his life.

“This is really awkward,” the guy said, scratching the back of his head with a nervous grin.

“What’s going on?” Tobirama insisted, his eyes honing in on Naminé.

Her cheeks were red and her both of her arms were thrown around the two people she was with, despite being shorter than the two of them.

It was the woman who spoke next, “hi, I’m Kurenai. I know we’ve never met before but we’re Dr. Nakano’s friends and—”

“My _only_ friends,” Naminé cut in, her eyes half lidded as she rested her head against the guy’s shoulder.

“And we were out at a bar and well… I’m sure you can see she had a little too much to drink,” Kurenai tried, unable to hold Tobirama’s gaze for more than a few seconds at a time.

It wasn’t like Naminé to get absurdly drunk like this. And he never would have thought she would do something so careless with everything that was going on with her lawsuit and her stalker.

He couldn’t help but cross his arms and glare at the woman as she giggled, now leaning her head against Kurenai instead.

“I told you he would be mad,” Naminé tried to say it quietly in Kurenai’s ear, but really ended up just shouting it in a whispered tone.

“I followed them over in her car,” the guy said, fishing Naminé’s keys out of his pocket and offering them to Tobirama, who begrudgingly took them, still fuming where he stood.

“Yeah, I know her pipes burst at her place so she mentioned she was staying with a friend,” Kurenai explained. Tobirama narrowed his eyes. So that’s the excuse she was using? “And she had your address saved and mentioned this was the place. I hope it’s okay we brought her here.”

Tobirama huffed and pinched the bridge of his nose, “it’s fine.”

“Oh man, he’s mad,” Naminé tried to whisper again, but she was too busy giggling and trying to hug the two of them that her words were hardly coherent.

“In her defense, she really didn’t drink too much,” the guy tried. “But she didn’t eat anything but M&M’s all day and…” He trailed off when Tobirama glared daggers at him.

“Please don’t be upset with her,” Kurenai said.

“He’s the one,” Naminé paused midsentence to yawn. “Asami was talking about.”

“Asami was there?” Tobirama deadpanned.

“Ah. So you’re the one they were fighting about. Makes sense,” Kurenai said under her breath, shooting the guy a look.

“Excuse me?” Tobirama stated, not sure he wanted to know why Asami and Naminé were fighting about him.

“Nothing,” Kurenai said quickly. “C’mon, Doc. You’re his headache now.”

The man pulled Naminé’s arm up over his head so she was only leaning on Kurenai now, and Kurenai did the same, only she still held Naminé’s elbow to keep her standing straight up.

“Oh boy, he’s pissed,” Naminé said with a giggle.

 Tobirama huffed. So much for Naminé being a responsible adult and coming back late because of work. Leave it to her to come back late because she was drunk.

“Naminé, enough,” he said with a frown.

“Wish me luck,” Naminé said in a singsong voice, pulling away from Kurenai and taking heavy steps through the front door.

“Thank you for keeping her safe,” Tobirama said. Naminé’s friends nodded and then they left.

He closed the door, setting her keys down on the table by the door, and crossed his arms as Naminé just stood there in front of him with her hands behind her back.

“I know you’re mad,” she spoke very slowly, clearly trying very hard not to slur her words so he wouldn’t know how intoxicated she really was.

“Mm,” he muttered.

“But listen,” she slurred her words just barely and scowled, clearly trying to get better control of herself. “I didn’t eat today—”

“You should have,” he deadpanned with a glare.

“ _Shh shh shh_ ,” she said, waving her hands as she swayed side to side. “And then ya know, I had a few beers and Kito brought over some shots,” the more she spoke the worse her slurring got. “And you can’t just take _one_ shot,” she insisted, those glassy eyes of hers widening. “So I had a few and hereee we are.”

He shook his head in exasperation. No point in trying to reason with a drunk. All he could do was get her to bed so she would fall asleep already.

“Enough,” he walked by her, hoping she would follow, but as soon as he walked past her, she got off balance and had to hold the wall to keep herself standing.

She was a giggling mess, her hand pressed to her stomach as she clutched onto the corner of the wall with whatever strength she had left.

“You move too fast,” she said through her laughter.

“Insufferable woman,” he muttered.

“Rude,” she said casually, pushing herself away from the wall and following him with slow steps. “You need a drink. Lighten up a bit.”

“What I need is for you to go to sleep,” he retorted.

“Always so grumpy,” she said with a yawn.

He reached the steps and Tobirama paused, waiting for Naminé to catch up to him. When she did she looked up the stairs and erupted into another fit of giggles.

“That is _a lot_ of steps. Can’t I sleep on the couch,” she swayed side to side again and for a minute there he thought she was going to lose her balance, so his hand shot out to her lower back to help steady her.

“You’re not sleeping down here with your back,” he said as he desperately tried to keep his irritation in check. No point in yelling at her when she was drunk. Not unless he wanted her to cry—which he didn’t.

“You feelin’ me up?” She asked with a lazy grin, nodding at where his hand was on her.

He was going to pop a blood vessel with the way he was glaring at her, “I’m trying to make sure you don’t fall and break your neck.”

She shrugged with big dramatic movements and Tobirama removed his hand from her lower back when she said, “I’m jussayin’ you don’t need an excuse to touch me. You can touch me _whenever_ you want.”

He rubbed his eyes and inhaled sharply. Whatever higher power there was was testing him right now and he didn’t appreciate it at all.

“Would you just go upstairs?” He snapped.

“Don’t go yellin’ at me,” she grumbled. But she placed her hand on the railing and went to climb the stairs, but then she coughed and the force knocked her off balance and she was about ready to fall over once again.

“All right, enough,” Tobirama complained, grabbing her just before she really did fall this time.

In one smooth motion he lifted her up, one arm going around her back with the other going under her knees, being completely and utterly fed up with her behavior.

“Whoa,” she murmured as he carried her up the stairs.

She was lighter than he remembered and he really didn’t like that. Naminé was always small, as it was something she was horribly self conscious about her for as long as he could remember. But she was too light, having lost weight over the last nine years.

There wasn’t much to lose in the first place, so he couldn’t help the fact that he was actually mildly concerned about her health.

He tried to ignore Naminé’s heavy stare on him, keeping his focus on not letting her hit the railing or the wall or anything. And when he reached the top of the stairs, he didn’t even bother putting her down just yet, knowing that if he did he would have to drag her drunken self to the bedroom.

“Why are you staring at me?” He asked when she wouldn’t let up.

“’Cause you’re very attractive in an angry sorta way,” she said, giggling once again and leaning into his chest.

He huffed and entered his bedroom, and none too gently set her down on the bed. She groaned and rubbed her head when she pretty much collapsed onto the mattress and then proceeded to scowl at him.

“Couldn’t you be a little gentler?” She grumbled. “I know you like it rough, but that was unnecess—unness—unnecessary.”

His eye twitched. Did she really just say that?

“Go to sleep,” he hissed, having used up every last ounce of patience he had left.

“You don’t have to sleep on the couch. Just come cuddle with me,” she said in her drunken fit, erupting into giggles once more.

He scowled and crossed his arms.

He was definitely being tested.

“Try not to throw up,” he muttered, going to leave so he could finish working and go to sleep himself.

“Wait,” she complained. Tobirama stopped, halfway out of the room, and looked over his shoulder to see her crossing her arms and pouting.

“What?”

“What if… What if,” she paused and ran her hands over her face, clearly flustered. “What if some crazy trauma happens and they need—they need me to come in? I can’t fall asleep I might have to operate,” her words were badly slurred now and Tobirama could see that it was taking every effort for her to keep her eyes open.

He sighed, “you’re drunk, Naminé.”

“You don’t know that,” she murmured, her eyelids getting heavy as she finally lied down on the side of the bed that was furthest from the door.

“I do,” he said back.

“Uh no,” she wrapped her arms around one of his pillows. “Your pillows smell nice.”

He shook his head, not even believing that this was the same woman that somehow managed to become an esteemed trauma surgeon, and shut the light off in his room and closed the door behind him.

Still though, there was a ghost of a smile on his lips as he walked downstairs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Asura? Ashura? ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
> 
> The medical stuff with Kanna is literally based on the first episode of Grey's Anatomy. Just throwing that disclaimer in there in case that shit is wrong lmao
> 
> Drop a comment please and thank you!


	8. Chapter 8

Everything hurt.

Naminé’s head pounded, her body ached, her stomach churned, and her back was on fire.

With a heavy groan, she opened her eyes and was assaulted by the sunlight that was just pouring into the room. She winced and put her hand to her forehead when her head only ached more. Then a white hot sting of pain jolted through her back and she actually yelped, immediately putting her hands behind her to rub it.

Percocet. She needed Percocet.

Naminé sat up, her head feeling like it was about to explode and glared both at the sun and at the fact that she realized she was in Tobirama’s bedroom.

She huffed in frustration. It was nice that he was letting her stay with him, but did he really have to give up his bed for her? She didn’t think so.

She vaguely remembered last night. She remembered going to the bar, getting into an argument with Asami, drinking too much too fast on an empty stomach, and she remembered Kagami taking her keys and Kurenai coaxing her into her car after asking where she was staying. The rest was fuzzier, but she remembered getting dropped off and saying something exceedingly stupid to Tobirama and him pretty much barking at her to go upstairs.

She was going to get a lecture and she knew it.

But before she got a lecture she needed to at least shower and take Percocet for her back. So she got out of bed with a shiver from all her body aches and padded to the door to go to the spare bathroom down the hall.

As soon as she entered the bathroom she peeled off her clothes from last night and took a scalding hot shower to wash the smell of stale beer and tequila out of her hair and off her body. The hot water worked some of the kinks out of her back, and for a minute there she considered not taking anything for her pain since the water seemed to help, but then she was done her shower and her back began to tense, so she took a Percocet just to be safe.

She slipped into a pair of faded jeans and an oversized off the shoulder sweater since it was already pretty cold outside and towel dried her hair. She didn’t bother with styling her hair or putting any makeup on because she was too hungover, but when she felt that she was slightly more presentable, she decided to go downstairs and risk the possibility of facing Tobirama.

Her head still pounded and she still felt slightly nauseous, but none of that compared to the way she felt when she came down the stairs and entered the kitchen to see Tobirama glaring at her from where he had his work set up at the kitchen table.

She pursed her lips and winced, “you know, you have an office upstairs—”

“You look remarkably put together for someone who should be throwing their guts up right now,” he stated.

Naminé blinked dumbly, “I’m going to pretend like that wasn’t a backhanded compliment.” She went over to the coffee pot and almost cried tears of joy when she saw that there was plenty left for her. “And I don’t usually get sick. You know that.”

“Do you have any idea how careless you were?” Tobirama said. Naminé could just hear the frown in his voice, and she rolled her eyes and poured a cup of coffee, scooping way too much sugar into the mug.

“Well I’m sure you’re going to let me know,” she retorted. She knew she was being argumentative, and not in her usual sarcastic way. Normally when she was sarcastic it was all in good fun, especially when it came to Tobirama. Sure, she liked to be sarcastic and smug around him, but that was only to get a reaction out of him. She had been like that since she was just a kid. But usually when Tobirama was actually upset, like he was right now, she tried to soothe his temper. Not make it worse.

“Did it ever occur to you that getting drunk like that when you have a stalker trying to kill you was an exceedingly stupid idea?” He snapped.

She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to find something to pacify him, but was having a hard time. So she came back with a very quiet, very tense, “you don’t know what my stalker has done to me, so if you could please refrain from lecturing me while I stand here and nurse my hangover, I would greatly appreciate it.”

Tobirama gave her a nasty look, one that absolutely seared her skin. “Do you enjoy being the most insufferable woman that I have ever met?”

No. She didn’t.

“I made a mistake and I’m sorry,” she conceded. She walked over to the kitchen table and sat down across from him, not looking away from that angry gaze he had on her. The easy thing to do would have been to snap back at him. The right thing to do would have been to pacify him, which was the route she decided to take.

She owed him that much after he gave her a place to stay and took her to her condo after Hidan broke in.

Tobirama’s glare didn’t falter, but it did ease up, just a bit.

“I’m apologizing here, Tobirama. Meet me halfway,” she said carefully.

He huffed and pinched the bridge of his nose when he looked away from her. He looked like he was having some sort of an internal debate, probably trying to decide if he wanted to forgive her or if he wanted to keep lecturing her.

Before, if he looked like that, she would have gone up behind him to massage his shoulders or even kiss the shell of his ear. Anything to make him relax and let go of his anger for at least a second. But now? Forget it. She couldn’t do that. Not even if part of her wanted to. Not even if the part of her that still got flustered around him told her to.

“You were being careless,” he said, though his words weren’t dripping with as much venom as before. “What if your friends didn’t drop you off? What if your stalker was around? What if something happened to you?”

“I wasn’t thinking,” she said under her breath, trying as hard as humanly fucking possible to bite back her pride.

She knew she was hotheaded. She knew that Tobirama was even more hotheaded. And she knew that unless she wanted to piss him off even more and have him go off on her, that she needed to get a handle on her own temper first.

“Clearly not,” he snapped.

She closed her eyes and took a sip of overly sweetened coffee. Sometimes she wished she had Hashirama’s temperament when it came to dealing with the younger Senju brother.

“I’ve already apologized,” she said. “I’m sorry for acting careless and I’m sorry for making you worry.”

“I wasn’t worried,” he said quickly.

Naminé couldn’t help it when she narrowed her eyes. He didn’t really expect her to believe that, did he? Okay fine, Tobirama Senju was not someone who was prone to worrying, but when it came to people he cared about he was. And all right, he definitely didn’t care about her the way he used to, but he had to at least care on some level. Otherwise why else would he be so mad?

“You don’t expect me to believe that, do you?” She asked. She tried to keep her voice as even as possible when she said it, not wanting to accidentally be sarcastic and set him off again.

He glared and crossed his arms, “yes.”

Naminé clenched her jaw, “all right.” She swallowed back the sarcastic _‘bullshit’_ that was on the tip of her tongue. If she couldn’t pacify or soothe him anymore, then she was better off walking away before she couldn’t hold it in any longer and escalate the discussion further.

“Excuse me,” she muttered. She got up from the table and headed out of the kitchen. She heard the distinct annoyed huff that came from him, but she didn’t look over her shoulder to try and talk to him.

She knew that his anger wasn’t solely from her coming back drunk last night. She knew that there was nine years of silence on her part that just fanned his temper. What she didn’t know was whether or not she was ready to sit down with him and address that silence.

Running away just seemed easier.

She headed for the entry hall to grab her stuff to leave for a little bit. Thankfully her purse was hanging up, and she grabbed it, fishing around for her hospital pager since she technically was on call. She took one look at it to make sure she hadn’t missed anything, and then after deeming that she was in the clear, clipped it to her belt loop and made a beeline for the door.

But the minute Naminé opened the front door she gasped when she was greeted with someone standing directly on the other side of it.

“Nami!”

“Hashirama?” She asked in confusion, still feeling her heart about to beat out of her chest from him scaring her half to death.

The older Senju brother’s eyes lit up like a Christmas tree as he stepped through the threshold, holding a small brown bag in one hand and a coffee in the other.

“What are you doing here?” She asked.

Hashirama kept that broad smile on his face and said, “I always come over on Saturday morning to have breakfast with Tobirama. I brought bagels today if you want one.”

Warmth bloomed through her chest despite still being caught off guard, “that’s so sweet.”

Hashirama shrugged, “someone has to take care of him.” Naminé’s eyes fell to the floor as a coil of guilt tightened in her stomach. “You look tired.”

She looked back up at him and gave him a weak smile, “I think you mean hungover.”

Hashirama smirked at her, “aren’t you a little old to be partying like that?”

“Hey, I am not that old and I was not partying,” she said. “I met some coworkers at a bar and you know I can’t say no to shots.”

“I do know that,” Hashirama laughed and put a warm hand on her shoulder. “Hopefully you didn’t give Tobirama too much of a hard time when you got back.”

Naminé rubbed the back of her neck and cleared her throat, “I think I may have asked him to cuddle with me.”

Hashirama erupted into booming laughter and Naminé couldn’t help but smirk in spite of herself. It was just so hard not to with Hashirama’s grin being so goddamn infectious.

“Brother,” Tobirama’s voice cut through his brother’s laughter and the smile fell right off of Naminé’s face.

“Morning,” Hashirama greeted, still smiling and oblivious to the sudden tension. “I brought bagels.”

“Mm,” Tobirama hummed. His eyes then focused on Naminé and he crossed his arms, bringing her attention to the broadness of his shoulders. “You’re going out?”

She couldn’t help it when she let out a defeated sigh and said a weak, “yes.”

“Where? The hospital?”

She pursed her lips, “not sure.”

Naminé immediately noticed the way Tobirama’s shoulders seemed to tense at her answer, and the glare that settled on his face. God, she really didn’t want to fight with him. That’s why she wanted to leave. The idea was to spare herself from his abrasiveness while he cooled down since apparently her presence only seemed to agitate him further.

“Stop being ridiculous,” he warned.

Her hands shook with frustration. She wasn’t trying to be ridiculous. She was trying to let him cool off.

“I’m not. I’m trying to give you some space since you’re very clearly still upset with me,” she said, knowing that her voice was probably shaking just enough for both of the brothers to notice it.

“Did I say I was upset with you?” Tobirama asked, trapping her under that cold stare.

She inhaled sharply through her nose, “you didn’t have to.”

Tobirama stared her down with a look that was too intense for anyone to meet his gaze, and Naminé tried to hold her ground for as long as she could. Truthfully, if her blood wasn’t boiling in frustration, she might have taken a second to appreciate how nice Tobirama looked despite being so sleep deprived, but just meeting his eyes was enough to make her forget that because his stare was just too much. And Hashirama, poor Hashirama, could definitely feel the tension in the room as he was clearing his throat, attempting to get their attention.

“Nothing good ever happens when you two look at each other like that,” he tried.

Tobirama sighed in exasperation, but his glare didn’t ease up and neither did his posture. If anything he just looked stiffer, as she could see the tension in his arms and the small crease in his forehead.

But Naminé knew she couldn’t win in a stare off with the younger Senju brother, so she huffed and eventually threw her hands up in defeat and grabbed her purse, slinging it over her shoulder.

“Look, I’m sorry okay? I’m just going to leave for a little bit,” she said with a frown, having had enough of his unrelenting temper.

She intended on walking out of the house without a second’s hesitation, but Tobirama’s harsh words cut through the air before she ever got the chance.

“Go ahead. You’re good at that.”

She almost tripped over her own two feet because his words stunned her that badly.

Naminé froze and turned to look at him, not even being able to register the presence of an extremely uncomfortable Hashirama who was trying to stay out of the way. Her heart hit the floor, her stomach rose to her throat, and heat pricked the back of her eyes.

“That was low. Even for you,” she murmured.

Then she walked out and slammed the door shut.

* * *

The second Naminé was out of the house, Hashirama was turning a wide eye to Tobirama, jaw slack, ready to demand answers.

“Is there a reason why you two seem completely unable to get along for more than three seconds at a time?”

Tobirama hated that he lost his temper like that and said what he did. It was like he could hear his father in the back of his head, scolding him for snapping like that and hitting below the belt. He hated himself even more for the look on her face as soon as the words left his mouth. He should have dropped it. She tried to calm him down by apologizing. She tried to calm him down by leaving. But he just couldn’t drop it. He couldn’t drop the fact that she had put herself in so much danger with everything that was going on. For Christ’s sake, his anger made his heart feel like it was going to burst from his chest.

But he shook his head and headed for the kitchen to have breakfast with his brother, determined to not feel anymore guilty than he already did.

“Because unless I happen to be from another dimension, there was once a time where you actually enjoyed each other’s company,” Hashirama added with a frown.

Tobirama grabbed his coffee, “Naminé and I have always bickered.”

“Yeah, you have. You _bickered_. You didn’t actually fight,” Hashirama pointed out, going to grab a knife to cut into a bagel. “I can’t believe you said that to her. What’s wrong with you?”

Tobirama’s hand clenched around his mug.

“How can you show her compassion one minute by giving her a place to stay and then the next minute say something like that?”

He didn’t have an answer. All he knew was that he was upset that she had been so careless for putting herself in danger by drinking until she was unable to form a coherent sentence, and that he had no idea how to address that anger.

Tobirama thought that he had buried all of his anger revolving around Naminé years ago. But just like that, she was back in his life and every little thing she did just set him off. Generally, she tried to get a reaction out of him by saying sarcastic little comments when he was being too stoic or what have you. But she hadn’t tried to get a reaction out of him that morning. She actually tried to diffuse the tension by apologizing and walking away.

But it was just too hard for him to drop it because all of that anger he buried away was slowly being dug back up, screaming to be directly addressed, since he had never addressed it in the first place. He just locked it away and pretended that it didn’t exist—that it never it never existed.

But with her around it was becoming harder and harder to leave it locked away. At some point, he didn’t know when, it was going to have to be addressed.

“Can I ask you something?” Hashirama asked when Tobirama had been silent for too long.

“Mm,” he mumbled, putting his coffee to his lips.

“Do you actually know why Naminé left?”

Tobirama went still, the words hanging heavily in the air.

He set his coffee cup down and paused, taking a moment to compose himself before giving his brother a tight, “yes.”

Hashirama wasn’t smiling for once. His face was very serious, frowning as his eyebrows knit together.

“Was it a good reason?”

Tobirama’s eyes drifted to the kitchen counter, clenching his jaw _hard_.

“It had to be,” Hashirama said softly. “Otherwise you wouldn’t have just let her walk away.”

“Why are you asking me this?” Tobirama said, trying to remain indifferent as he cut his own bagel and avoided his brother’s heavy stare.

“Because I always assumed you never knew because of how everything happened, but I don’t know… She said that your comment was a low blow, so it made me wonder if you actually knew.”

Tobirama held in a sigh, trying to not clench his jaw so tight. He could still remember everything about that day and see it plain as ever behind his eyes if he thought about it for more than a few moments.

He hated how much his stomach twisted in pain when he thought about it.

“She had a valid reason,” he said, feeling the tension in his neck as he spoke.

“…Did you want her to stay?” Hashirama asked, looking at Tobirama as if he was broken or something.

“Of course I wanted her to stay,” Tobirama snapped. _Of course_ he wanted her to stay. He wouldn’t have asked her to marry him if he didn’t. He had only loved the insufferable woman since he was a teenager. Of fucking course he wanted her stay. What kind of question even was that?

“Then—”

“I didn’t just let her walk away,” he hissed. “She had to leave, all right? She needed help.”

“Help with what?” Hashirama muttered. He wasn’t looking at Tobirama anymore. He was just staring at his bagel, pretending that it was much more interesting than their conversation. And yeah, it was a little stupid, but Tobirama appreciated that his brother at least wasn’t looking at him like he was broken anymore.

“It doesn’t matter,” he said harshly.

Hashirama winced and was silent for another long minute.

“Do you ever wish she had stayed?” He asked under his breath.

Tobirama gave a great sigh, all of those old memories and feelings flashing behind his eyes again.

There was a period, somewhere between two and three years, where every God forsaken day he wished she stayed. Those first few years of being alone had been excruciating. The first year he woke up every morning feeling emptier than he ever had. The second year he woke up every morning feeling angrier than he ever had. By the third or fourth year of her absence, he learned to get over it. And by the time five years had passed, he banished every goddamn memory of Naminé Nakano he ever had from his head.

“I don’t know,” Tobirama grumbled.

But he did. He did know. He just didn’t want to acknowledge that pathetic weakness and vulnerability by saying it out loud.

It just would have hurt too much.

* * *

Naminé pursed her lips, tapping her foot impatiently as she waited for her latte to be made. When she left Tobirama’s she had been so flustered and upset and frustrated that she didn’t have a destination in mind when she stormed out. She just wanted to get away before she did something she regretted.

And that resulted in her going downtown and finding a cute little coffee shop after she spent fifteen minutes looking for a parking spot.

She picked at her fingernails while she waited for her coffee, hating how her mind kept drifting all over the place. Maybe it was time to go back to her condo. She could change the locks and get a security camera or something and then she’d be fine.

Right?

But the thought of coming home to an empty house every night after both her car and house had been broken into made her skin crawl and made her fidget and itch for a painkiller, so she pushed the thought far from her head.

“Medium vanilla latte,” the barista said, putting Naminé’s coffee on the counter.

Naminé grabbed the drink and went to sit at one of the tables in the corner but stopped, narrowing her eyes at an oddly familiar tall man with a giant mane of thick black hair.

“Large black coffee,” he grunted as he ordered his drink.

“Room for cream and sugar?” The barista asked, avoiding his eyes.

“No,” he said.

Naminé took a few steps closer and actually let out a laugh when the barista handed him the coffee. Not because it was funny, but because of who the hell it was.

“Madara Uchiha, my eyes do deceive me,” Naminé said as she took quick steps to catch up to his long stride before he left.

Madara wasted no time in craning his neck over his shoulder to give her a terrifying scowl, but the scowl was immediately replaced with a mild look of confusion when his eyes settled on her.

“ _Naminé?_ ”

“If I had to bet on who would have been the one to leave this shithole city in the last nine years, it would have been you,” she said.

So far, coming back to the city had been nothing but trouble. Sure, she got a promotion and was able to afford a nicer place to live instead of where she stayed during her residency and fellowship, but with all of the drama that followed her, she really regretted coming back. She may have grown up in the area, but so far she hadn’t felt like she had come home or anything else. Not even around the Senju’s.

But for some reason, seeing Madara made her feel warm with nostalgia and she couldn’t help it when a grin stretched across her face. So she walked right up to him and wrapped her arms around his torso, hugging him tighter than she thought possible.

She expected him to stiffen and maybe even push her off, but he indulged her for whatever reason. He just chuckled very quietly and wrapped one arm around her waist and patted her back until she let go.

“You are the first person since moving back that I’m actually happy to see,” she said.

“That is pathetic,” Madara remarked, leading them over to one of the little tables by the window. “I almost didn’t recognize you with the short hair… What the fuck are you doing back here, Naminé? After that little stunt you pulled I didn’t think you’d ever show your face around here again.”

Why did everyone feel the need to bring that up?

“Well it is a horrible gruesome story that you do not want to hear,” Naminé said, taking a sip of her latte.

Madara smirked, “well gruesome is my middle name in case you want to unburden yourself.”

She bit back a smile. It was comforting beyond belief to talk to someone and not feel pressured to tell them what happened. And oddly enough, because of his nonchalant attitude, she kind of wanted to tell him the full story?

“Before that, what have you been up to? You still own that strip club?” She asked.

Madara gave her a smug look, “as a matter of fact I do.”

“Of course you do.”

He shrugged, “it’s a hell of a business.”

He would never admit it, but Naminé knew that Madara was proud of Mangekyo Strip Club. The guy managed to pick himself up by his bootstraps after being pushed out of Konoha Enterprises and build his own business. And hey, it obviously was good idea since Madara didn’t seem to be hurting for money, at least not when considering the expensive suit he wore.

“You still a doctor?” he asked, turning the question on her instead.

Naminé grinned, “I’m an attending trauma surgeon now. So I’m the real deal.”

Madara smirked again, “of course you went into trauma. You’ve been an adrenaline junkie since you were a kid.”

“I don’t know why everyone says that. I’m really not.”

“Right, of course not. So you didn’t jump off the roof that one summer?” Madara commented.

Naminé couldn’t help it when she snickered into her drink, “Izuna said I wouldn’t do it, so naturally I had to.”

“And then you broke your arm,” he said.

“My mom was so mad,” Naminé smiled at the memory.

“You should have seen my father. He screamed at Izuna for three days straight,” Madara said, his smile turning bitter at the mention of his late brother.

Naminé’s eyes flickered back to the table. It was hard to believe how much time had passed since they were all kids. It was so hard to believe that they were all adults now and had their own lives and real responsibilities, especially compared to when they were kids and daring each other to do stupid things like jump off of the roof and onto a trampoline.

Since then their parents, Izuna, Kawarama, and Itama were all gone.

It was no wonder she felt more comfortable around Madara. At least Hashirama and Tobirama had each other, along with their cousins like Toka. But Madara? Madara didn’t have anyone. Sure, there were some cousins and distant relatives, but he never got close with any of them. And Naminé didn’t have anyone either.

So no wonder she felt so much more at home with Madara than anyone else.

“So are you going to tell me your gruesome story?”

She considered avoiding the subject, changing it all together, or maybe even trying to come up with some half assed lie.

But hell. If she was going to come clean to anyone, why not Madara? The guy didn’t give a shit about anything anyway. It wasn’t like she had to worry about him flying off the handle and doing something stupid in a fit of rage like Tobirama might have. Madara would probably just find the whole thing scummy and leave it at that.

So yeah. She decided Madara deserved the truth.

“Would you believe me if I told you that I moved back because I was assaulted by a stalker one night? And that he beat me up to hell and back and wanted to sacrifice me to his creepy god? And that I was so scared and desperate to leave that moving back home seemed like a good idea?”

Madara narrowed his black eyes and kept a heavy focus on her, “what the fuck?”

She nodded, “yeah, you should see all the scars I have from it. I can never wear a bikini ever again,” she muttered, grabbing her latte and avoiding Madara’s eyes.

“Is the sick fuck in jail?”

She shook her head, “nope. Out on bail and breaking into my car and my house.”

She looked up at Madara, and the look on his face didn’t disappoint. He looked disgusted and livid and downright intimidating all at once. She had spent her entire life around intimidating men. Butsuma Senju, Tobirama, Izuna, even Naminé’s own father had been an intimidating man, but none of them ever made her skin crawl like Madara did when he got that look on his face.

“Do you want me to kill him?”

Naminé winced. There was no lightness in his voice and she knew that he was serious when he said it.

Madara was always serious when it came to things like that.

“I’m waiting on my lawsuit, but if it doesn’t end in my favor please… By all means,” she said, half joking and half serious.

“Say the word and I’ll take care of it.”

She knew it was messed up, but she really did appreciate the sentiment, “trust me. I might take you up on that.”

Madara frowned, “you said he broke into your car and your house?”

“Yeah. Left me wonderful little threats too.”

“Is it safe for you to be staying there then?” He asked.

Naminé’s eyes flickered to his and then she was rubbing the back of her neck. Maybe this particular subject was something she should have kept from Madara.

“Probably not. But I’m not staying there so…” She watched as he raised an eyebrow and she sucked in a breath. “I’m staying with Tobirama.”

Madara made no visible reaction, his death stare just boring into her goddamn soul.

“You are ice cold,” he said after a long moment of just staring at her. Naminé tried to glare at him but found that she wasn’t able. “I mean really… Talk about ice woman.”

She huffed, “well I’m certainly not warm and fuzzy.”

Madara snickered, “that’s for damn sure.” He took a long drink of coffee. “It’s actually kinda hot how goddamn frozen your heart is. Staying with the guy you left on your wedding day? I feel a chill in the air.”

She groaned and ran her hands over her face. She knew she shouldn’t have told Madara. Why the hell she even did, she had no idea.

Momentary lapse of judgment.

“I am not that bad… And I would expect that type of comment from someone like Toka, not you.”

“And I would expect Toka to be the runaway bride. Not you,” Madara said back, looking far too smug for his own good. “Not when you’ve been in love with the guy since you were seven-years-old for God knows what reason.”

She sighed and leaned her elbows on the table, “you’d have to get me good and drunk if you ever wanted that story.”

He smirked at her, “my club has a bar in case you ever want to make good on that.”

She chuckled, “instigator.”

“Enabler,” he said back.

“Can you imagine Tobirama’s face if I told him I was meeting you for drinks,” Naminé said, a little bit ashamed with herself for how funny she thought it was.

Madara chuckled under his breath, a sound that was both condescending and amused, “he’d have a goddamn aneurysm.”

“Am I horrible person for wanting to do that? Because I do,” she remarked, and Madara just looked at her, probably imagining all the sadistic ways he could use that to his advantage.

“Maybe, but you know I look for any reason to piss him off.”

Oh she knew that. Anyone who knew Madara and Tobirama knew that. At least when she and Tobirama fought, they didn’t actually fight. They just bickered and bickered and bickered until one of them got pissed off enough to stop responding. But Madara and Tobirama? Oh no. The fights between them were mean, horrible, and sometimes violent.

“Remember back when I was in high school and the two of us got into a fight, and he said he wouldn’t take me to prom? And how you heard and said that you would just come take me instead?” She couldn’t help it as a laugh overtook her, remembering all too well.

Madara didn’t even bat an eye, “he apologized, didn’t he?”

“Tobirama doesn’t apologize,” she said easily. “But he did agree to go.”

“Same difference.”

She took another sip of her drink, “speaking of the Senju’s—did you and Hashirama ever make up?”

That death stare on Madara’s face was enough to tell her everything she needed to know. She looked away from him, suddenly way too preoccupied with looking around the little café to actually address him again.

“Thought not,” she hummed under her breath.

“ _Tch_ ,” he hissed. She looked back at Madara, more than a little relieved when she saw that he wasn’t scowling so goddamn hard anymore.

“So how long until you two make up?” He asked.

“Hashirama and I aren’t fighting?” Naminé said as she narrowed her eyes a bit.

“Wrong brother,” Madara said as he gave her a knowing look, causing her to huff.

“I don’t think we’ll ever make up. I screwed that up big time,” she rubbed the back of her neck, feeling stupid and sad and just downright pathetic.

“Do you want to make up?” Madara asked.

She played with a lock of her hair, “I don’t know. I don’t think I have a right to want that.”

Madara drank more of his coffee and checked the time on his watch before he responded with a very casual, “you’ll be screwing in a week.”

Naminé’s cheeks went red. She crossed her arms and looked away from Madara, “do you have to be so vulgar?”

He didn’t even look remotely bothered, “at least I said ‘screw’ instead of ‘fuck’, and I own a strip club. I make a living off of being vulgar.”

“Okay well whatever term you used, I highly doubt anything is going to happen,” she grumbled, letting her eyes flicker back to him.

“Yeah right. You’ve got that pathetic lovesick look all over your face. What happened? You two have a fight and you stormed out? Back in the day that was usually the case.”

She rolled her eyes, “more or less. I wasn’t trying to fight with him. I was being good, okay? I wasn’t being sarcastic or an ass or anything. I was just trying to give him space.”

Madara leaned back, “he’s probably still pissed you left.”

“Well I’m still pissed I left,” she snorted.

Madara shook his head, “I’m sure you are, Princess.”

That hit her hard, and one of those awful waves of nostalgia swept over her like she had just been dipped in cold water.

When her parents moved them all into her childhood home, it was two houses down from where Butsuma Senju lived with his four boys, and four houses down from where Tajima Uchiha lived with his two sons. Both men had been widowers and worked themselves relentlessly, so the kids were often left unattended for extended periods of time.

No one else had been Naminé’s age, or even around her age for that matter, on the block except for the Senju and Uchiha boys. She was only five when she moved, and being lonely since she had no siblings and since both of her parents worked, Naminé often found herself tagging along with the neighbors.

She befriended the Senju boys first, as they were much easier to get along with than either of the Uchiha’s, but the two families would always run into each other. They were kids after all, and only had the boundaries of their neighborhood block to play in, so it was natural that they would get in each other’s way from time to time. And somehow, Naminé still didn’t know to this day, Hashirama and Madara became really close friends. They would hang out and Naminé, being several years younger than the both of them, would try to tag along when the others were busy, and Hashirama always let her because he was just too nice to say no.

Madara used to try to get her to leave them alone by doing things he knew she wouldn’t participate in for whatever reason. Maybe for fear of her parents, or fear of getting hurt, who knows. But whenever Madara succeeded, he would sneer at her and call her a little princess who couldn’t keep up with boys.

Even as they got older and started to get a little closer, whenever Naminé did something that Madara didn’t approve of or whenever he just wanted to annoy her, he would smirk and call her a princess.

Which naturally had been her worst nightmare at the time since she grew up trying to be “one of the boys”.

So to hear him use the term now, decades later, Naminé found herself caught off guard and without anything witty to say.

So she came back with a lame, “you haven’t changed a bit.”

Madara didn’t look at all fazed and said, “neither have you.”

Her eyes flickered down and bit the inside of her cheek, “I wish that were true.”

They were quiet for a long moment after that, and Naminé didn’t risk meeting Madara’s eyes. She knew that he would be studying her, trying to get a clear reading on what the hell was going through her head.

Finally, he broke the silence with a short, “gimme your phone.”

Naminé looked at him, raising an eyebrow and digging her phone out of her purse regardless.

“Why?” She asked as she handed it to him.

“So you can reach me whenever you want to drink tequila and piss off Tobirama.”

Naminé watched as he put his number in and then texted him from her phone. Then he handed it back to her and stood up from the table.

“Leaving so soon?” She asked, feeling way too disappointed about having to be alone again.

He nodded, “have to. I gotta meet up with one of my girls.”

Naminé stood up and smirked, “oh you mean one of your strippers?

He snickered, “well she’s not anymore. Now she’s the unfortunate soul who gets the manage all of the strippers.”

Naminé actually was a little impressed, “you promoted her? Madara, that’s almost nice of you.”

He waved his hand in a dismissive gesture, holding the door open as they walked out of the coffee shop, “she backed me into a corner. I had no choice.”

“I need to meet the girl who backed Madara Uchiha into a corner.”

He shrugged and put his free hand in his pocket, still nursing his large cup of coffee, “come to Mangekyo and you can meet her sometime. I think you’d like her. She’s a doll.”

Naminé smiled at him, “seeing you has been the first good thing to happen since I moved back to this shithole.”

Madara smirked, “make sure you tell Tobirama that.”

She laughed under her breath and then they parted ways.

That honestly made her feel a lot better than she cared to admit. Madara was always a pain in the ass to deal with, regardless of if he was a friend or not. But sometimes, if you were really lucky, _sometimes_ he could be just what you needed to bring you back down to ground level again.

And sometimes, more often than not, he could be the bane of your existence.

Having calmed down, Naminé went to her car that was parked a block or two down the street, eyeing up the little stores downtown.

That was when she saw a little flower shop across the street with white roses in the window.

She couldn’t help herself. At the sight of her favorite flower, Naminé crossed the street and went into the little shop.

Naminé had generally always been a little cagey with a buck. She got a lot of her furniture from yard sales, used to get her clothes from secondhand shops all the time, and budgeted like a madwoman. She didn’t often allow herself to indulge in expensive pastimes or even purchase anything that was over a certain dollar amount. It was just something that happened from growing up in a blue-collar household (and from accumulating a crippling amount of debt from med school).

However, when she became an attending surgeon and started to make better money, she allowed herself one expensive indulgence.

Flowers.

Naminé loved flowers more than anything, and at her old apartment she used to have flowers delivered every few days. She usually didn’t mind what type they were, sunflowers, daisies, lilies, anything. But her absolute favorite flowers were white roses.

When she walked inside her face lit up. Honestly, if she hadn’t pursued surgery, she might have been a florist.

Granted, her father might have exiled her though.

“Can I help you?” The woman at the counter asked, drawing something on a sketchpad.

Naminé gave her a friendly smile, “any chance I could get a little bouquet of white roses?”

The woman straightened up and gave Naminé an easy smile, “sure. Special occasion?”

She shook her head, “no, they’re just for me. I’m a sucker for roses.”

The woman nodded, busying herself with gathering some of the flowers. “Me too. They remind me of my daughter. They’re her favorite.”

Naminé gave her a tight smile, “like mother like daughter.”

_* * *_

_Seventeen-year-old Naminé Nakano crossed her arms tight over her chest, pushing open the door of a hospital bedroom alone. She looked exhausted and half put together, her long blonde hair scraped back into a messy French braid with purple circles beneath her honey topaz eyes from lack of sleep._

_“Honey!”_

_Naminé closed the door behind her, biting down hard on her lip and standing at the end of the hospital bed, not inching any closer to the woman who was lying down with tubes sticking out of her arms._

_“Hi Mom,” Naminé said under her breath._

_Her mother struggled to sit up in bed, wincing in pain as she did, but Naminé didn’t move to help her._

_“I was afraid you were mad at me because you didn’t come by,” her mother said after she propped herself up a bit to get a better look at her daughter. “But when I got the white roses I knew you weren’t too upset.”_

_Naminé immediately frowned and narrowed her eyes._

_“But I didn’t…” She stopped when her mother gestured to a beautiful bouquet of white roses that were sitting in her window._

_But she hadn’t sent any flowers?_

_“How’s school going?” Her mom asked suddenly._

_Naminé looked back at her mother, “it’s fine.”_

_“Excited to graduate?”_

_“I would be if you were coming,” Naminé said, knowing that her words were too harsh for her recovering mother._

_Her mother raised her eyebrows in confusion, “of course I’m coming. Why wouldn’t I?”_

_Naminé pushed her shoulders back and raised her chin the way her late father always taught her. Better to just come out and say it than beat around the bush._

_“Because I’m checking you into a rehabilitation center.”_

_Her mother went silent, the only noise in the room coming from the monitors that she was hooked up to._

_“What?”_

_“You’ll be transferred from here to rehab when the doctors sign off on everything.”_

_Her mother shook her head, “honey, I-I’m fine! I just took a little too much Oxy for my back. I’m fine. I am!”_

_Naminé set her jaw, “you need help.”_

_“Well you can help me, Honey. You’ve always been my rock. I’m fine, you know that. I can’t help it that my back is all messed up—”_

_“I’m tired of being your rock,” Naminé snapped, feeling tears prick the back of her eyes. “You’re a drug addict, and I’m sorry because those doctors never should have prescribed you those pills to begin with, but you need help and I… I’m not…” she stopped and rubbed her eyes when her voice cracked. “I’m not doing it anymore. I can’t.”_

_All she could hear were her mother’s strangled whimpers and Naminé already regretted coming in the first place._

_Naminé sniffled and rubbed her eyes again, “I hope you like the flowers.”_

_She didn’t stay to hear what her mother had to say, she just briskly left the room and went straight back out to the waiting room. She wanted to be as far away from the hospital and as far away from her mother as possible._

_As soon she got back to the waiting room her eyes went to Tobirama, and he stood up, holding his keys in one hand, ready to take her home._

_“How was it?”_

_Naminé knew he hated public displays of affection, and she knew it well, but she just didn’t care. She went right up to him and wrapped her arms around his torso and buried her face in his chest when her eyes got too hot._

_She felt his chest rise and fall with a long sigh, but his arms came up to encircle her nonetheless._

_“I’m sorry,” he said._

_Naminé shook her head, trying to compose herself. She knew she shouldn’t let it get to her, but it did._

_“It’s fine,” she said, even though she was still holding onto him._

_Tobirama didn’t say anything, probably knowing that his words would fall on deaf ears, so he opted for squeezing her just a little tighter for reassurance._

_“Come on,” he said afterwards._

_She nodded and pulled away from him, wiping her eyes as they left the hospital._

_“Someone sent her white roses and she thought they were from me,” Naminé muttered when they got into his car. “She said she thought I was mad but when she saw them… I don’t know. I guess she thought I wasn’t upset.”_

_“I sent them,” Tobirama said as he started the car up._

_Naminé raised an eyebrow, “what?”_

_“I knew that you might not have visited her and I didn’t want you to do anything you’d regret.”_

_“So you sent her flowers?”_

_“I sent her white roses because I knew she’d think they were from you. I just didn’t want you to feel guilty in case you decided you didn’t want to see her, and no one would have blamed you if you didn’t.”_

_Naminé tried to look at Tobirama, even though he was steadily avoiding her eyes with laser like focus on the road as he drove her home._

_She looked down and reached over to take one of his hands and give it a squeeze._

_“Thank you,” she said so quietly that she almost doubted he heard it._

_But he must have, because he took her hand that was in his and brought it to his lips, giving it a tender kiss._

_“You’re welcome.”_

_* * *_

Tobirama wasn’t home when Naminé got back, and she wasn’t sure whether or not to be thankful. She was glad that he wasn’t there to rip into her again, but at the same time she wanted to apologize again. She was just so tired of fighting, and since he was letting her stay with him, she really felt like it was her job to try and make things right between them.

Plus, Tobirama was basically allergic to ever admitting he was wrong. So there was also that.

She fiddled with her little bunch of white roses and walked into the kitchen, looking around for something to put them in.

The closest thing to a vase were the tall drink glasses and Naminé shrugged, grabbing one of the glasses and filling it with water. Then she grabbed one of the smaller knives from the drawer and worked on cutting down the stems and arranging them in a way that all of the roses fit.

When she finished, she grabbed the glass now filled with the flowers and walked into the living room, setting them down on the coffee table.

If Tobirama didn’t like them he’d just have to deal. White roses were the one thing that always made her feel better.

She relaxed on the sofa and played around with her phone for maybe a half hour or so until he got back.

Naminé put her phone down and looked up when he walked into the living room, heading directly for the hall that led to the stairs.

“Hey,” she said, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear. She took in his appearance, noticing that he was in a fitted t-shirt and sweatpants, and had a sheen of sweat on his face. “Just come back from a run?” She asked, knowing that it used to be his preferred method for blowing off steam.

He looked at her briefly and nodded, but didn’t actually say anything as he made his way through the living room.

Naminé played with the sleeves of her sweater and tried not to feel so disheartened at getting the silent treatment. She should have expected that with the way she walked out earlier.

“Tobirama,” she said. She quickly stood up from the couch and hurried over to where he was about to leave the living room to disappear into the hall.

He still didn’t respond and she fought back the urge to roll her eyes in annoyance.

She put a hand on his shoulder and he craned his neck to get a better look at her, “what is it?”

“I’m trying to talk to you,” she said, not sure why she felt so on edge. It wasn’t that hard. She just had to say sorry for her behavior last night, and sorry for leaving, and leave it at that.

“So talk,” he said firmly. Okay. So he was still mad. Great.

It took all of her willpower to not give him a biting or sarcastic remark, but she managed for the sake of trying to make things right.

“I just wanted to tell you again that I’m sorry,” she admitted, hating the fact that she always had to be the one apologizing when it came to the two of them. “I shouldn’t have gotten drunk, I shouldn’t have been stupid, and I’m sorry for this morning. You just…” She stopped herself. He just what? He worried? He cared? He made it evidently clear that morning that he did _not_ worry or care. So she played with the sleeves of her sweater and looked down. “You were right.”

“Mm,” was all he said. He pulled away from her and walked out of the living room so he could head upstairs. And Naminé just stood there dumbfounded for a minute.

That was the kind of thing that made her want to revert back to sarcasm.

“Tobirama,” Naminé said again, following him into the hall and to the stairs. Was he seriously going to pretend she didn’t say anything and walk away?

He ignored the nasty glare she gave the back of his head and Naminé gaped. Just before he headed up the stairs, she stormed over to him and slipped by him so she blocked him from walking away from her. Tobirama sighed and rested his hand against the railing, one foot on the landing and the other on the first step.

“You’re really just going to ignore me when I’m standing here apologizing?”

Tobirama just gave her a bored look, “I’m not ignoring you.”

“No, you’re just being evasive,” Naminé said.

He scoffed and went to walk around her up the stairs, but when he tried to, she mimicked his movements and blocked him so he couldn’t get by.

“Stop this,” Tobirama said as his jaw visibly clenched.

“Make me,” she said back, holding her chin up. She couldn’t help it when the words left her mouth. She had been biting back her sarcasm with him all day. At some point it was bound to come out.

He narrowed his eyes and straightened up, “Naminé, all I want to do right now is take a shower. Not bicker with you.”

He tried to sidestep her for a second time, but Naminé stopped him and put her hands on his chest, forcing him back down a stair.

Those intense eyes were on her in an instant, glaring a hole into her face. She immediately removed her hands and put them behind her back.

“Can you at least acknowledge my apology if you’re not going to accept it? I hate being ignored like this.”

Tobirama narrowed his eyes for a fraction of a second, “acknowledged. Now move.”

She frowned at the disingenuous response, “Tobirama, I don’t want to fight with you anymore.” His eyes were heavy on her and under his intense gaze, Naminé swallowed hard. She felt like she was sweating all of the sudden. Why did he have to look at her like that? It made her all fidgety and awkward and she didn’t appreciate it at all.

His voice was low, almost soft when he said, “I don’t want to fight either.”

“If it’s easier for me to leave then just say the word. I’ll go to a hotel or something or stay at the hosp—”

“No,” Tobirama said right away.

Her eyebrows knit together when she looked at him curiously, “so then you forgive me?”

He actually smirked and her stomach did a little flip, “if I say yes will you let me go upstairs?”

Naminé pressed her lips together to hold back a smile, “only if you say yes and mean it.”

Tobirama held her gaze carefully, but his tone was light when he responded with, “then yes. I forgive you.”

She blinked, the words sinking in, “really?”

Any other words that were on the back of her lungs got caught in her throat when Tobirama had enough of her little game when she didn’t move out of the way fast enough. He took a step up, entering her personal bubble, and braced one hand on the railing while he brought his arm around her waist and pulled her flush against his chest. Then he lifted her up with the arm that encircled her waist and turned around to set her on the landing of the stairs, all while giving her a smug look. Afterwards, he turned back over his shoulder and went upstairs, taking the steps two at a time.

Naminé stood there like an idiot, jaw slack, chest tightening, and blushing as hard as humanly possible.

When the hell did Tobirama get all touchy like that?

She cleared her throat, pretending that she absolutely was not nearly as flustered as she was and mustered up a glare to direct at him.

“You can’t just pick me up and move me around like some ragdoll!” She shouted.

“I just did,” Tobirama said easily, disappearing from sight.

Naminé crossed her arms over her chest and just fumed there for a few moments, hating the fact that she could still feel the blush on her chest and face, and the somersaults in her stomach. Her skin tingled from where he touched her and Naminé shook her head in frustration. She ran her fingers through her hair and muttered angrily under her breath, way too pissed off at him for actually being able to fluster her like that.

Madara’s words echoed in the back of her head, saying that she had a lovesick look on her face.

She really was lovesick, wasn’t she?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's probably typos in here. You know, I always think I catch them all and then SIKE. I post a new chapter and I read it over and find a bunch. Sooo those will get fixed eventually. So annoying. Sorry about that. I hate it too.
> 
> Leave your thoughts with a comment!


	9. Chapter 9

Naminé tossed and turned on the couch, unable to fall asleep. She sighed and sat up, grabbing her pager off of the coffee table.

Nothing.

Normally Naminé hated being on call because the uncertainty of not knowing whether or not she would have to drop everything she was doing to go into the hospital sucked. But tonight was another story. She couldn’t sleep, her back ached, and she just wanted something to do.

She absentmindedly played with her hair and let her eyes adjust to the darkness. If only there was a TV or something in the living room to entertain her through her little bout of insomnia.

Naminé stood up, pulling the sleeves of her sweatshirt down over her hands as the late night chill in the house wracked through her body. She made her way to the kitchen, trying to be as quiet as possible, knowing that Tobirama was a light sleeper and woke up at any little sound he heard.

Rifling around the kitchen quietly after midnight was easier said than done, but Naminé managed it, finding the green tea. She then filled a mug with water from the tap and heated it up in the microwave.

Two seconds before the microwave was done, she stopped it and pulled the mug out, walking over to the counter to make her tea. She faced the window above the sink and her eyes must have played a trick on her, because she froze dead in her tracks when she swore she saw someone looking in on her.

Which resulted in her gasping and dropping the mug, shattering it to pieces.

“ _Shit_ ,” she hissed, stepping back so she didn’t accidentally step on a shard of glass.

She rubbed her forehead with her thumb and placed a hand on her hip, waiting for the inevitable moment where Tobirama came downstairs and gave her crap for being loud and probably “insufferable”.

She didn’t have to wait long, because sure enough Tobirama was storming into the kitchen, flicking the lights on and looking around with wild eyes a moment later.

“I’m sorry. I just broke a glass,” she muttered. “Go back to sleep.”

He let out a sigh and rubbed his eyes. Naminé risked a look at him and saw that he was in sweatpants and lacked a shirt, which she thought was odd because the house was kind of chilly and if there was one thing Tobirama hated more than insufferable women like her, it was the cold.

“Are you okay?” He asked, his voice still rough with sleep.

Her eyes flickered to the kitchen window, “yeah. I’m sorry.”

“Why are you awake?” he asked, grabbing a dish towel and crouching down to clean up the broken glass. Naminé followed suit, grabbing an extra towel and crouching down across from him.

“Couldn’t sleep. I was going to make some tea but I freaked myself out,” she admitted. Her eyes then fell to his hands that were scooping up the glass and she frowned. “Please don’t cut yourself. I may be a surgeon but I don’t have sutures here.”

“You worry too much,” Tobirama said easily, standing up to throw out the big chunks of glass. Naminé did the same and kept looking at the kitchen window. “Did you see something?” Tobirama asked. His eyes were on her in an instant the minute he realized she kept looking outside.

Naminé clenched her jaw and looked at him, “just my eyes playing tricks on me.”

He didn’t seem convinced because his eyes were going right to the kitchen window. Naminé bit down on her lip, feeling bad for waking him up, especially since she could tell he hadn’t been sleeping well lately.

She risked resting a hand on his bare shoulder, and just like that, his eyes were on her again, “I’m really sorry. I was just making tea and I freaked myself out. Just go back to sleep.”

He didn’t look convinced as he crossed his arms and said, “well I’m up now.”

She rolled her eyes and crouched back down to try and clean up the rest of the broken glass. As far as she was concerned, unless she was operating on someone, she couldn’t do anything right.

When she finished she straightened up and brushed her hands off to see Tobirama putting a tea kettle on the burner.

“Please go back to sleep,” she pleaded, going to sit on one of the stools at the kitchen island.

“It’s fine,” he leaned against the counter with his arms still crossed, patiently waiting for the water to come to a boil. Naminé sighed and rested her cheek against her hand. She felt guilty and even a little stupid. Obviously there was nothing in the window, she just tricked herself into thinking there was because she was paranoid out of her goddamn mind.

“How’s your back?” He asked.

Naminé looked at him and shrugged. She was going close to twenty hours without Percocet, so that was good. But her back still twitched in pain every now and then.

“How are your shoulders?” She said back.

“…And you say I’m evasive,” Tobirama said. His tone was light though when he said it and he wasn’t glaring at her just yet, so that was a good sign.

“Well you are,” she remarked.

“So are you,” he said, and there was a barely visible smirk on his face.

Naminé chuckled softly under her breath. She was pretty sure that this might have been the first time that they were in a room together without being at each other’s throats. There was no tension between them, no angry glares, and to be honest, she kinda liked it. It was a nice change.

“So I take it you’re not still mad at me?” She asked, still leaning against her hand.

“I never was,” Tobirama said plainly.

She couldn’t help it when she narrowed her eyes in suspicion. His words from earlier played like a broken record in the back of her head, saying that she was good at leaving. You just didn’t say something like that unless you were mad. It hit a little too below the belt for that.

“Could have fooled me,” Naminé mumbled.

“You of all people should know when I’m actually mad,” he said. She watched as he absentmindedly uncrossed his arms to rub one of his shoulders.

“In my defense, I’m a bit out of practice,” she said as she smirked in spite of herself.

There was a soft, barely audible chuckle that snuck past his lips, and Naminé’s stomach did a little flip.

“You know, you really should stop sleeping on your stomach. Your shoulders wouldn’t be so sore that way,” she said.

He rolled his eyes in response but didn’t say anything back.

She gave him a devilish smirk, feeling a little more confident, and continued with a smug, “I could give you a massage.”

Those intense eyes of his were on her in an instant, staring her down immediately, “you are the most—”

“Insufferable woman you’ve ever met. I know. You’ve only told me about eight thousand times,” she retorted, but she wasn’t actually annoyed or anything. She just was a little too prone to using sarcasm.

“ _Tch_ ,” he muttered, looking away from her and going over to one of the cabinets to pull out two mugs.

Naminé’s eyes followed him, admiring the lines of muscle in his back. She didn’t even chastise herself for it either, despite knowing that she should _not_ have been looking at him like that. She just couldn’t help herself.

The saying ‘old habits die hard’ existed for a reason.

“I’m just offering,” she said as he took the tea kettle off the burner and poured two cups of green tea. “Who better to give you a massage than a surgeon? I’ve got great hands after all.”

She heard him scoff immediately, putting multiple teaspoons of sugar into her mug, and then walked over to the island and stood across from her, sliding her cup over to her.

“Is that what they teach you in med school? How to have great hands?”

“No, it’s what they teach you in residency,” she said, not missing a beat. She held up her hands for added effect and wiggled her fingers, “my hands save lives.”

His eyes focused on her hands for a long moment and then they were on her face again, “being a surgeon has made you arrogant.”

She shrugged, “I’m not actually arrogant, but I do have good reason for it.”

“I know you do,” he said, putting his tea to his lips.

“Hey, you should be thankful that I’m even offering. It’s not every day I offer to put my skills to use by giving a man a massage and putting my hands on him.” She knew she was being obnoxious and probably crossing a line, but she couldn’t help it. It was just too easy to fall back into a familiar state of teasing with him. She just missed it.

She missed _him_. 

She innocently took a sip of her overly sweetened tea when he shot her a firm look.

“Stop being suggestive.”

She snickered, “you would know if I was being suggestive.”

Tobirama raised his eyebrows and locked her into a stare, “like when you were drunk and told me that I could touch you whenever I wanted?”

Naminé blinked, heat rising to her cheeks, “I did not say that.”

There was a ghost of a smirk on his face, “you did.”

She just stared at him, totally dumbfounded. She knew she probably said some stupid things to him in her drunken state (like being 99.999% sure that she asked him to cuddle with her) but she had a hard time believing she would be so bold. That just wasn’t usually how she was after a few too many drinks. If anything, she usually was just friendly.

She shook her head, “I don’t believe you. I’m not suggestive when I’m drunk. I’m just friendly.”

Tobirama took another sip of his tea and said a casual, “you’re suggestive when you’re with me.”

Naminé did not have a response to that because goddamnit he was right, and that smug little look on his face told her that _he_ knew that _she_ knew he was right.

Hell, she almost started having horrible flashbacks to a time when they were teenagers and when Naminé would just do and say the stupidest shit around him after drinking too much tequila with Toka.

Again. Old habits die hard.

“I don’t want to know what else I said,” she grumbled.

“No, you don’t.”

She groaned and drank more tea. So much for any dignity she had left.

“I don’t know why I think tequila is my friend. I always think it’ll work out and then before I know it, I’ve had four shots and I’m saying stupid shit,” she said, knowing full well that she bordered on becoming a rambling mess. “I think I may have a problem.”

Tobirama sighed and gave her a long look. But at least he wasn’t glaring, and she took that as a good sign, “aren’t you a little old to be taking shots of tequila?”

Naminé rolled her eyes, “it just happened. Dr. Kito brought over shots as a peace offering, and then it was my turn to buy, and then it all went down hill.”

For whatever reason, Tobirama entertained her and didn’t scold her for her behavior when the words left her mouth, and she really appreciated that.

“Why was a peace offering needed?”

She pursed her lips, frowning at the memory, “because Asami and I may have gotten into a disagreement.”

He looked bored when he said, “about?”

Naminé waved her hand dismissively. There was never any point in talking to either of the Senju brothers about her dislike of Asami. Asami moved onto their neighborhood block when they were children a year or two after Naminé did, and for whatever reason, she got along with the Senju’s just as well as Naminé did. Whenever the girls got into arguments none of the Senju’s would take anyone’s side, which only infuriated a younger Naminé more. Often times whenever she wanted to complain about Asami, she did it to Madara or Izuna, because neither of them liked her because they thought she was annoying.

“Nothing. She’s just evil,” Naminé muttered. “I can’t believe Hashirama is letting her deliver his baby.”

Tobirama kept his eyes steady on Naminé’s face, reading her like an open book and said, “he wanted you to do it.”

She bit the inside of her cheek and put her tea to her lips, taking a moment to compose herself. “I know, but she’s the one who delivers babies all the time. I’m just the one who stitches up gangbangers after they’ve had a drive by.”

Naminé really hated herself for saying that. She loved her specialty, she really did. She loved that she was able to operate on people who had traumatic accidents and possibly save their lives or prevent any crippling injuries. She loved that she was able to come to the aid of people like Kanna Otsutsuki and repair the damage left by a gunshot. It was why she went into trauma in the first place.

But after years of working in a level one trauma center and having to operate on countless gangbangers who had been stabbed or shot, it got old. And if those were the people she was healing, did it really do society any good to have them back on the streets? Compared to someone like Asami Matsuo who was a neonatal surgeon and literally helped bring tiny lives into the world, Naminé felt… Well she felt a little mediocre or second-rate.

“You don’t mean that,” Tobirama said. He leaned his elbows on the counter and sighed as his head dropped between his shoulders, trying to roll them out. She could tell he was sore and actually felt a little bad for poking fun at him for it. Sleeping on the couch those couple nights that she was upstairs definitely hurt his shoulders more than he cared to admit.

“Not usually,” she said back. She paused and put both of her hands around the mug and tapped her fingers. “All joking aside, I really could give you a massage or whatever. You look pretty stiff.”

He straightened back up and looked at her with half lidded eyes. She wasn’t sure why, but she felt like she had to hold her breath in case he blew up on her or something. Maybe she overstepped? Maybe he was now realizing that he should have been mad at her for waking him up? It had to be something like that, otherwise why else would he have been giving her such a heavy look?

“Why are you looking at me like that?” She asked quietly. “I’m just trying to help.”

He broke their gaze with a quick, “I know.” He went over to the sink and put his mug in it, and afterwards headed over the entrance of the kitchen. “Maybe next time.”

He walked out of the room, presumably to go back to sleep and Naminé looked down, tapping her fingers against the glass.

Then she put her hand over her mouth to hide her smile.

* * *

“Do you think I should text Asami?” Mito asked Hashirama. She reclined into their sofa and looked at her husband who was drinking coffee and scrolling through emails on his phone. His dark eyes flickered away from his phone the minute she said something, and then he was giving her an easy smile and setting the device down so he could sit with her.

“I’ll text her later, but I don’t think she’ll come. I’m pretty sure she’s working anyway,” he said as he wrapped an arm around Mito’s shoulders while the news played on the TV. “Which might be a good thing if Naminé ends up coming. They don’t really get along.”

Mito couldn’t help it when she frowned, feeling a little apprehensive, “do you think Tobirama will actually bring her? They seemed very… _Tense_ last time they had dinner here.”

Hashirama shook his head as he drank more of his coffee, enjoying the slow start to their Sunday morning. “They’ve always been like that, and I know he’ll bring her because he’ll feel guilty otherwise.”

She frowned and played with a lock of hair that escaped her bun, “they’ve probably been fighting a lot since she started staying with him.”

She looked at her husband for confirmation, but Hashirama didn’t seem too concerned. Granted, he never seemed too concerned about anything, but considering how she had seen her brother-in-law act around the pretty doctor? Well. She thought that there definitely had to be at least some room for concern.

Hashirama caught the look he gave her and let out a sigh, “they don’t actually fight, they just _bicker_ until they’re blue in the face. Literally all the time. Nonstop. It’s harmless for the most part,” he paused and then began to laugh softly, “it’s probably their twisted version of foreplay.”

Mito knew she shouldn’t laugh, but she did. She hadn’t ever seen Tobirama with a girl, and then the first one that comes along since her marriage to Hashirama was the complete opposite of what she’d expected. Mito figured that if Tobirama ended up in a romantic relationship with anyone, that he would have been with a girl who was fairly passive and very easy going in nature to counter his abrasive attitude. But instead of a quiet and reserved woman, Mito was instead introduced to Naminé Nakano, a petite little woman with an evasive nature, devilish smile, and sharp tongue.

“Have they always been like that?” Mito asked.

“Oh yeah,” Hashirama said right away. “They were actually worse when they were kids.”

Mito’s eyes widened, “really?”

Hashirama shrugged, “pretty much. Naminé had a crush on him from the minute they met, it was really obvious too even though we were all so young. I dunno how he didn’t see it,” he paused and then snickered, “well it’s Tobirama, so of course he didn’t see it… But anyway, he was really composed even back then, so naturally she liked getting a reaction out of him since almost no one could, and she did that by getting under his skin. Honestly, she does it better than I ever have. It’s like she just has to look at him once and he gets all flustered.”

Mito definitely agreed. She didn’t miss the way Tobirama took one look at Naminé and actually looked like he had seen a ghost that night Hashirama tricked him into coming over.

But still, she gave Hashirama a little bit of a fond smile, “so they’re childhood sweethearts?”

Hashirama grinned, “Tobirama will deny it even when he’s on his deathbed, but yes.”

“That’s so sweet,” Mito admitted.

Her husband laughed and took a long swig of his coffee, “don’t let my brother hear you say that.”

“If that’s how she’s always felt about him then why did she leave?” Mito knew that Hashirama didn’t have an answer for her. She doubted anyone did. When she met Hashirama seven years ago and started to learn more about his family, she heard the wedding story. At the time, she thought whoever did that to Tobirama was a monster and that he was better off without them, but Hashirama never seemed to share that sentiment. But that made her skeptical, not because she didn’t believe her husband, but it was because he saw the good in everyone, so of course he might not be as angry about the situation as someone like Toka.

But then Mito met the woman face to face not too long ago and had been pleasantly surprised? Naminé was well mannered, if not a little skittish, and didn’t strike Mito as someone to be particularly cruel like that.

So it just seemed like there was a missing piece.

“I don’t know,” Hashirama admitted. “I never got it either. I mean Naminé has literally been in love with him since she was probably six or seven and never had doubts, not even when they got older. She’s not the type of person to give up on what she wants.”

Mito definitely could see that, but then again, anyone who went on to become a surgeon had to be like that.

“Well I hope everything works out for the best,” she said. She then leaned forward to grab a list that was sitting on the coffee table.

“Mm,” Hashirama hummed in agreement.

Her eyes scanned over everything and she craned her neck over her shoulder, “who all is coming?”

Hashirama shrugged, “the usual? Tobirama. Toka. Hiruzen might too but he said he wasn’t feeling well.”

“Is Tsunade coming?” Mito asked.

“She said she’s going to try. I don’t think she’s bringing her boyfriend though,” he said.

Mito nodded, “I’ll just make extra.”

“If it’s too much we don’t have to do this,” Hashirama was giving her that puppy dog look, the one where his eyes got really big as he leaned a little too close. She smiled and briefly kissed him on the lips to pacify him.

“I like our Sunday dinners,” she said.

“So do I, but you’re pregnant and I don’t want you to—”

She kissed him again to keep him quiet and he sighed against her lips, cradling her face with his hand and kissing her a little harder before he rested his forehead against hers.

“I’m fine. I promise,” she said.

He gave her an affectionate smile and kissed her forehead.

“Okay. You win.”

* * *

Toka plunged her hands in her jacket, knocking on the front door of Tobirama’s house and ringing the doorbell. It was too goddamn cold out and she was getting pissed off that she was waiting outside for as long as she was. She just wanted to get some coffee and get back to the office. Honestly, if she hadn’t been in the area and hadn’t gotten the update she just did, she might not have stopped by at all.

She glared and went to knock on the door again, but it swung open and revealed Tobirama scowling at her.

“What are you _doing_?” He snapped.

“What? You don’t know how to answer the door? It’s cold as shit and I’m freezing out here,” Toka snapped back, shouldering past her cousin and walking inside. She kicked off her boots and hung her jacket up, turning her attention to Tobirama.

“Where’s Naminé?” she asked. “I have to talk to her.”

“You couldn’t have called?” Tobirama said as he crossed his arms.

“Why? Am I interrupting something?” Toka hissed. She didn’t bother waiting for her cousin to snap at her again, and she walked deeper into the house, pausing when she entered the living room and saw Naminé curled up on the couch, fast asleep.

Toka pulled her phone out to check the time and looked at Tobirama, “it’s eleven. Why is she still asleep?”

He sighed, “she couldn’t sleep last night.”

Toka frowned, “and you know that how?”

He scoffed, obviously done with her and said, “I’m going to my office.”

Tobirama walked away from her and headed upstairs. Toka rolled her eyes and decided not to interrogate him any further and instead walked over to the couch and ripped the blanket off of Naminé’s sleeping figure.

It worked like a charm, just the way it did when they were teenagers, and Naminé’s eyes opened and she groaned as she pulled her knees to her chest.

“I hate you so much,” she complained, covering her face with her arms.

“Wake up, Sleeping Beauty,” Toka said. “We have business.”

“Sorry, but my business is confined to the hospital,” Naminé still had her head buried in her arms and Toka just glared at her.

“Unless you want your little stalker following you to the hospital, you better get up,” Toka warned, sitting down on the couch now that Naminé was curled up in a ball. She set her bag on the floor and pulled out a tablet.

Naminé huffed and sat up, crossing her legs as she did and rubbing her eyes.

“What is it?” She asked. She pulled her sweatshirt down over her hands and rubbed her exposed legs to probably warm up since she was in a pair of shorts. Toka’s eyes fell to Naminé’s legs for a brief second, and that’s when she saw it.

There were deep warped scars on the upper part of Naminé’s thighs, and Toka’s stomach hit the floor. She knew they were there. She had seen the photographs of Naminé’s injuries after all, but seeing the scars in person had made them a little more real.

Naminé followed Toka’s eyes and looked at her legs, and when she saw what Toka was looking at, she gave a heavy sigh and put her hands over her thighs so the scars were no longer visible.

“You should see my stomach,” Naminé muttered.

Toka didn’t say anything, she just pulled up the emails and files on her tablet and then handed the device over to the blonde woman beside her.

“Trial starts in a week. I’ve got enough evidence to work with that I think it’ll be quick and relatively easy to get a conviction. That being said,” Toka paused. She knew how touchy this next part could get with clients who had been victims of similar crimes. “I’m still going to need you to testify.”

Naminé’s face went white as ash, and her honey topaz eyes widened. She gave Toka back the tablet without looking at it and said a firm, “no.”

“Naminé—”

“ _No_. I’m not going to sit there and talk about what happened and have some asshole defense attorney call me a liar or say that I was asking for it because I was walking home alone or whatever. Absolutely not,” Naminé snapped.

Toka fought back the urge to sigh. She had a feeling that was going to be Naminé’s reaction.

“Naminé, I’ve got a lot of evidence, but this guy is good. He’s really good at not leaving anything behind, he’s good at playing up different defenses, he’s one hell of a liar, and unless the jury hears your testimony, I don’t think I’ll be able to put him in prison. He’ll probably just plead insanity and be institutionalized for a few years and get out and do it all over again to someone else.”

“What about him breaking into my car? My house? Isn’t that proof enough?” Naminé asked. Toka didn’t miss the way she was picking at her nails.

“It’s not enough,” Toka said.

“He left his stupid cult book in my car and wrote about ‘Jashin’ on my mirror! How is that not enough?” She was shouting now and her voice was starting to shake. Toka had to calm her down and she had to do it quick.

“Listen to me,” Toka hissed. “The justice system is innocent until proven guilty. That means the burden of proof is on us. Unless we can prove beyond a reasonable doubt that he was the one who assaulted you, he’ll get off with either a slap on the wrist or be acquitted. I need every single juror in there to believe you.”

Naminé shook her head and ran her trembling fingers through her hair, “use the photographs of my injuries and the stuff that happened in my house. Have another doctor from my last hospital testify that he had been stalking me—”

“I’m already doing every single one of those things,” Toka said. “The fact is, jurors can be really hard to convince, especially when you consider the defense selecting people who might be obsessed with their own religion or people who believe you shouldn’t have been walking home alone. I can say whatever I want and present all of the facts. The truth is, they’re more likely to believe us if you get on the stand and testify to what happened.”

Naminé didn’t say anything right away, she just sat there, picking at her nails and staring at the floor.

“We want this sick fuck put away. In order for me to do that, I need you to testify.”

Naminé closed her eyes and ran her hands over her face, probably weighing the options she had.

“…fine.”

That’s when Toka noticed Naminé suddenly jolt forward and seethe through her teeth.

“What’s wrong?” Toka asked, her eyebrows knitting together.

“Nothing, it’s just my back,” Naminé said quickly.

Toka frowned. She remembered when Naminé got into that horrible car accident and had been in the hospital for weeks, and in physical therapy for what felt like years after it. She had broken her back in three places and for the first few months, she could barely walk or lie down for extended periods of time because the pain had been so bad.

Toka was just surprised that after all this time the woman was still having pain.

“I have Tylenol in my bag if you need it,” Toka offered.

Naminé waved her hand, “no it’s fine. I have… A muscle relaxer upstairs,” she muttered, avoiding Toka’s eyes.

Toka narrowed her eyes, but didn’t dwell on it.

“All right. I need you to stop by my office sometime this week so we can prep your testimony and get you prepared to be cross examined and all of that,” Toka said as she pulled her calendar up on her tablet.

“I work every day this week, but I can stop by after work one night,” Naminé said softly. “How’s Tuesday or Wednesday?”

“Tuesday would be better.”

“Okay. I’ll just come by when I’m done. It’ll be around eight,” Naminé said, still fiddling with her nails.

“That’s fine,” Toka said. She added it to her calendar and then slipped her tablet back into her bag.

She took another long look at Naminé, and noticed that the woman seemed really uncomfortable. Her shoulders were slumped forward and her head drooped a little. She just seemed to want to make herself as small as possible.

Toka held in a sigh, not believing that she was about to say what was thinking. “Does Tobirama know about all of this?”

Naminé’s eyes flashed to hers in confusion, “obviously he knows I have a stalker who broke into my house, but that’s it. Why?”

It took a lot of willpower for Toka to swallow her pride, but she managed. “That’s it then? He doesn’t know the full story?”

Naminé frowned, “no, only you do. Why?”

Toka scratched the back of her head. She couldn’t believe that she was about to say it, “I’m only asking in case you wanted him to be there the day you testify.”

Naminé only looked more confused, “I don’t follow. I thought you hated the fact that I brought him into this?”

“Oh I do. Trust me. I really do,” Toka muttered. “But I know testifying about something like this is hard, especially since Hidan will be there, looking at you the whole time. I just…” Toka huffed, struggling to find the right words. “Look, I know Tobirama makes you feel safe. So if you wanted him there, I would understand.”

Instead of getting all embarrassed and denying it like Toka expected her to do, Naminé only gave her a bitter smile and held Toka in a quick gaze, “well you make me feel safe too.”

Toka absolutely, positively, astronomically _despised_ the fact that she felt as sentimental in that moment as she did. She hated the fact that a lifetime of friendship with Naminé Nakano was all rushing back to her in one moment, but it did. In less than a second, Toka remembered having sleepovers with Naminé, sneaking out at night together, getting ready for school dances together, listening to Naminé go on and on about her crush on her cousin, getting drunk on tequila, graduating together, going out to bars together, and being Naminé’s maid of honor.

And damnit all to hell because Toka actually felt a little sad that all of those memories were just that. They were just old, stupid, memories.

But she still felt the rush of nostalgia and sentimentality, no matter how much she hated it.

“Stop being so sappy. I’ll see you Tuesday,” Toka grumbled.

Then without another word or another look, she left.

* * *

Asami Matsuo looked at her phone, seeing the text from Hashirama asking her if she would be over for Sunday dinner. It was a thing that happened every Sunday, Hashirama having family dinner. He invited anyone with the name Senju, anyone’s significant others, and any old friends of the family.

And since Asami fell into the third category, she was always invited.

She didn’t always go because of her workload, but when she did she was always glad to be there. It was nice getting to see Hashirama and Mito, Tobirama, and even Toka, especially since she had warmed up to her after enough times, and that had been unexpected to say the least.

Toka never really liked Asami, since as kids she was Naminé’s best friend, but after Naminé ran away, Toka saw through the stupid little feud and actually became really friendly. Well… As friendly as someone like Toka could get.

It was just nice to not be the bad guy anymore.

Asami texted Hashirama back saying that she would try to come, but that she was busy at work and left it at that.

She went downstairs to get a coffee from the little café and saw Dr. Kagami Uchiha sitting at one of the tables, propping himself up on his elbows as he tried to stay awake. She felt bad for him, remembering her own residency, and decided to walk up to him after she ordered her espresso.

“Dr. Uchiha,” Asami said with a smile.

Kagami’s dark eyes flickered, “Dr. Matsuo,” he said with a nod.

“On call?” She asked.

“Yeah,” Kagami said as he rubbed his eyes. “Thirty hour on call in the trauma center.”

Asami pursed her lips tightly, “you seem to be spending a lot of time in trauma.”

He yawned and looked at her with an easy smile on his face, “well I’m trying to get a trauma fellowship here. Dr. Nakano even said she would put in a good word for me with Chief Sarutobi.”

Asami felt a bitter taste in her mouth, “really?”

“Absolutely,” Kagami said, now grinning. “I’d love to do it here since Dr. Nakano would be around. I heard that she cracked a chest in the ED when she was fellow and I’m dying to see her do it again one day.”

Asami pretended not to be put off at the mention of Naminé and gave Kagami a very tight smile, “are you sure that’s what you want to go into? I know a lot of trauma surgeons actually lose their skills after a few years since the field is trying to get away from invasive procedures.”

If she sounded bitchy, Kagami didn’t react to it, as he only shrugged and said, “well that’s why trauma surgeons also do a lot of general surgery. And if I’m in a level one trauma center it’s not a big deal. It’s not like Dr. Nakano has lost her skills.”

Asami nodded, “well I’m glad you’re such a big fan.”

Kagami frowned when his eyes flickered with realization. “O-oh. I’m sorry. I forgot you two don’t really get along.”

Asami sucked in a deep breath through her nose, “there’s just a lot of history there. She’s a fine surgeon and I’m sure she’d be an excellent mentor for you.”

Kagami didn’t seem convinced, “yeah, I hope.” He looked around the café, awkwardly searching for something to say. “So uh… What are you doing here? I don’t think I’ve ever seen you around on my weekend.”

Asami nodded, “I’m also on call. Picking up for a friend.”

“Ah,” Kagami said. “Well at least you’ll get to leave later.”

She laughed softly under her breath, “I will, but I’ve got to stick around until my patient has her baby. So who knows how long that’ll be.”

Kagami grinned, “no offense, that’s why I hated my OB-GYN rotation. You’re literally always on call.”

“Yes I am,” Asami remarked. She reached out to briefly squeeze his shoulder, “I hope I haven’t left you with too bad of a taste in your mouth after Friday. I promise I’m not always like that.”

She half expected Kagami to reprimand her for her behavior at the bar, to say that she was out of line and that he felt bad for Naminé, but he didn’t. He just gave her a shrug, “hey, it happens, and it could have been worse. Were you there that night Dr. Kururugi got on top of the bar and tried to give everyone a strip tease?”

Asami cracked a grin, “oh God, I was.”

Kagami laughed with her, “yeah, so I think you’re off the hook.”

“Well I’m glad for that,” she said. “It was nice talking to you, Dr. Uchiha. I’m glad you don’t think I’m some horrible monster.”

Kagami smiled, “not at all.”

Asami grabbed her drink on her way out, feeling better about the whole bar thing. It was probably the first time one of Naminé’s friends didn’t hate her by proxy.

She took a sip of her espresso and pulled out her phone to text Tobirama to see if he would be at Hashirama’s. He usually came, but sometimes got so busy with work that he forgot. Maybe if he did go, Asami could stop by for a little bit. She hadn’t talked to him at all lately. He said it had to do with something going on at work, but she still worried nonetheless. She knew he was someone who tended to overwork himself, and usually he needed someone to tell him to relax.

That’s when Asami’s pager went off for her patient about to deliver her baby. So she pocketed her phone and hurried upstairs, hoping for a quick delivery so she could go to Hashirama’s.

* * *

“This is weird,” Naminé muttered after she got out of her car when they got to Hashirama’s. Tobirama planned on driving both of them, but because she was on call she insisted on following him over in her own car.

“Mm,” he hummed under his breath.

Hashirama had family dinners every Sunday night, and felt the need to text Tobirama early in the morning to let him know that he should bring Naminé. Tobirama immediately said no, he was not going to bring her, but after enough guilt tripping, Hashirama got his way.

“Why am I here? I’m not family,” Naminé hissed. Tobirama could just feel the anxiety pouring off of her as they walked to the front door and he almost wanted to put a hand on her back or something to reassure her.

“Blame my brother,” he said. He understood her concern, but family dinners weren’t exclusive to just family. Half the time Hiruzen Sarutobi and his wife were there, and other times Asami was there.

“I blame your brother for a lot of things,” Naminé said. She crossed her arms and shivered when there was a gust of wind and walked a little closer to him. “So this is every Sunday, huh?”

“More or less.”

Tobirama didn’t even bother knocking when they got to the top of the steps. He just opened the door and held it for Naminé, ushering her to go in first. Her lips pursed into a thin line as she walked inside, and Tobirama wasn’t far behind her.

Naminé gave a deep sigh and paused before she went further into the house. Tobirama narrowed his eyes and unzipped his coat.

“What is it?” He asked when she just stood there.

“I-I shouldn’t be here,” Naminé said. She started to walk back to the door but Tobirama put his arm out to block her. It was so unlike Naminé to be nervous and second guess herself.

“Too late for that,” he said, looking directly into her eyes.

Naminé held his gaze for a moment and then looked away with a dramatic groan. She unbuttoned her coat and pulled it off to hang it up in the hall and nervously fiddled with her pager that was clipped to her belt loop. He watched her, a little amused with how flustered she was, and hung up his own jacket, following her into the living room.

“It’s about time!” Hashirama called out.

Tobirama nodded at his brother in acknowledgment and looked around the room to see Toka, Tsunade, and Mito.

“Tobirama,” Tsunade said as she gave him a smile.

“I’m surprised to see you, Tsuna,” Tobirama said, indulging her by letting her hug him. Tsunade didn’t usually come to Hashirama’s family dinners, though she was always invited. She was their youngest cousin and usually felt a little out of place since she didn’t grow up with the rest of them, but she was still a Senju, so Hashirama and Tobirama always made an effort when it came to her.

“I’m sure you are,” Tsunade remarked after she let go of him. Then without letting another second go by, she looked around Tobirama and her eyes were on Naminé in an instant and she immediately grinned.

“I heard you might be coming,” and Tsunade went right up to Naminé and engulfed her in an embrace.

Naminé’s face went white and her eyes met Tobirama’s in horror, probably worried that Tsunade might purposely choke her death with her freaky strength, but she didn’t. She just hugged Naminé tight, and when Naminé no longer feared for her life, she looked away from him.

He actually found it a little endearing, though he’d never admit it out loud.

“Hey, Tsunade. It’s been a while,” Naminé muttered. Tobirama watched as Naminé pulled back from Tsunade and immediately went to pick at her nails.

“I almost didn’t believe Madara when he told me you were back, but here you are,” Tsunade paused for a moment, visually taking Naminé in and said, “short hair suits you.”

Tobirama frowned. How the hell did Madara know Naminé was back?

“I guess you’re still working for him then,” Naminé said.

“I’m just his bookkeeper,” Tsunade assured.

It was no secret that Tsunade worked at Madara’s ridiculous little strip club. In fact, it was something Tobirama himself had lectured Tsunade on for probably hours at a time, but she never listened. Tsunade never really listened to anyone when it came to something she wanted to do. She swore she only acted as a sort of manager and bookkeeper, but Tobirama still hated the fact that one of his cousins not only worked in a strip club, but worked for Madara fucking Uchiha of all people.

“Ah,” Naminé said, her voice a little too soft.

“I didn’t know you saw Madara!” Hashirama said as he walked right up to Naminé and slung his arm around her shoulders. “How was he?”

“He was… Well he was Madara,” Naminé started. “But yeah, I ran into him at a coffee shop. I might try to grab drinks with him later.”

Tobirama could not help it when he felt his upper lip curl in absolute disgust. He had no idea that she had seen that disgusting waste of a human being and had no idea why she would ever plan to get drinks with him.

What the hell was she thinking? Why didn’t she tell him about that?

“Think he’s trying to get in her pants?” Toka murmured, coming to stand beside Tobirama.

He redirected his attention away from the insufferable woman that was Naminé and focused it on Toka instead, “excuse me?”

“Madara. You think he’s trying to get in Naminé’s pants by taking her for drinks?”

Tobirama crossed his arms, “I don’t care either way.”

“I’m sure you don’t,” Toka said with a sarcastic edge in her voice. “He probably just wants to do it to piss you off.”

Tobirama didn’t dignify that with a response. If Naminé wanted to be stupid by getting drinks with Madara, then fine. It made no difference to him.

“So are you and Tobirama back together or something?”

Tobirama looked away from Toka at the sound of his name and saw Tsunade still talking to Naminé, looking at her expectantly.

Naminé’s eyes flickered to him for a fraction of a second, and he didn’t miss the way her cheeks flushed.

“What? No. No, of course not,” Naminé scoffed a little bit, but he could still see the redness of her cheeks. “My pipes burst at my place and I needed somewhere to stay. Tobirama just happened to be nice enough to offer since he’s not far from my work.”

Tsunade shot Tobirama a look by craning her neck over her shoulder, “that’s oddly nice of you, Tobirama. I didn’t even know you two were on speaking terms.”

He didn’t say anything. It wasn’t his place to get caught up in Naminé’s little lie. If she didn’t want everyone knowing about her stalker problem, then that was her choice. But he wouldn’t participate in dishonest behavior.

“Yeah,” Naminé said as her voice hitched.

“How sweet of you,” Toka muttered, just low enough so he was the only one that heard her. Tobirama scowled at her. He knew she had an issue with Naminé staying with him, but that didn’t mean she had to be so obvious about it. Hell, he didn’t even see the point of Toka’s frustration. Naminé was once her closest friend. He assumed that Toka would have been happy that she came back.

“Tsunade, can you help me put dinner on the table?” Mito asked. She put her hand on Tsunade’s shoulder, probably sensing the rising tension in the room.

“Mito, I can help,” Naminé offered.

Mito smiled and waved her hand, “no, that’s okay. You’re a guest.”

“And I’m not?” Tsunade asked, though there was no bite to her words.

“You’re family, not a guest. There’s a difference.”

Tobirama didn’t say it, but he did think to himself that Naminé might as well have been considered family, especially if Hashirama had anything to do with it. There was even a time where she might have been considered more of a family member than Tsunade.

“Hashirama, where’s the beer?” Toka asked, abruptly leaving Tobirama’s side and going to his brother instead.

“You know I don’t leave alcohol out around Tsunade,” Hashirama said with a snicker. “She’ll start drinking and then trick me into making a bet with her.”

That’s when Naminé walked over to Tobirama, tucking a lock of blonde hair behind her ear.

“Remind me again why I’m here?” She said under her breath.

Tobirama kept his arms crossed, “because neither of us can say no to Hashirama.”

Naminé gave him a small smile. She seemed to be doing that a lot to him more recently, giving him soft smiles instead of condescending smirks. “Look at him, he’s like a golden retriever. How am I supposed to say no to that?” She asked, nodding at where Hashirama and Toka were having a discussion over whether or not they wanted to bring out the beer around Tsunade.

“When you figure it out, let me know,” he said.

Naminé laughed softly and fiddled with the sleeves of her sweater, “what’s in it for me?”

Tobirama could feel the corner of his lips quirk upward, ever so slightly, “my gratitude.”

She rolled her eyes, but didn’t actually seem put off by his comment, “that’s all?”

He raised his eyebrows suspiciously and turned slightly on his heel so he could face her more directly. “You’re already staying in my house, Woman. What more do you want from me?”

Naminé shrugged and that’s when he noticed the mischievous glint in her eyes, “I’m sure I’ll think of something.”

He shook his head, not bothering to wipe the barely visible smirk from his face, “do you enjoy being difficult?”

“No,” she said easily, as she rested her hand on his arm. “I enjoy getting a reaction out of you.” Tobirama’s eyes flickered to where her hand was on him, and then back to her eyes. It was one of the few times he couldn’t read her. Normally he could take one look at her and know exactly what she was thinking, even after nine years of being apart. But there was something in her eyes that he didn’t think he was reading correctly, because if he didn’t know any better, he would think that there was something almost affectionate about the way she was looking at him.

He wasn’t sure if he liked that or not.

Before he could say anything to her, she gave him a smug look and winked at him. Then she walked away from him and went over to Hashirama, instigating another stand off between him and Toka when she said that she could also use a beer.

Tobirama held in a sigh and looked at the floor, careful to compose himself. He didn’t want to give Naminé the satisfaction of letting her see that she actually managed to get to him.

She didn’t even get to him per se. It wasn’t like he was mad or irritated with anything she did.

She just…

Nevermind. It didn’t matter anyway.

* * *

Kagami had twelve more hours of his shift to go before he got to go home and sleep for twenty-four hours. So far he had been lucky. The ED was slow, the trauma center was slower, and he only needed to assist on some very minor procedures. A gallbladder removal here, an appendectomy there, and then the rest of the time he either did paperwork or tried to get a few hours of sleep in the on call room.

Currently he was in the ED, talking to some of the nurses that had come in a little earlier for the night shift to help pass the time.

But that got cut abruptly short when two interns and a third year resident were wheeling in a woman on a gurney.

“Dr. Uchiha, a little help please?” Dr. Kamizuki asked as they wheeled the woman into one of the rooms. Kagami noticed the resident performing chest compressions while Dr. Hagane had his hands pressed to a wound to presumably try and stop the bleeding.

Kagami switched into autopilot and went straight to the patient and visually assessed the damage while the resident briefed him on what was going on.

“Holy shit,” Kagami said with a heavy breath. The woman had more gashes on her abdomen than he could count, big swirling ones that not only covered her stomach and torso, but her legs as well. Blood was matted in her hair and she had horrible bruises covering her face and neck.

But that wasn’t what concerned Kagami the most. It was the fact that she was already bleeding out despite Kotetsu’s hands over a particularly large wound, and the fact that the woman was at least eight months pregnant.

“We’ve already paged Dr. Matsuo,” Izumo informed.

“Good,” Kagami said, running through a mental checklist of injuries that needed to be addressed right away in only seconds.

“Dr. Nakano is the attending on call. Do you want us to page her?” Kotetsu asked.

Kagami pursed his lips and sighed.

“Yeah, page Dr. Nakano and tell her to get here stat.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm well aware that the ages between the Senju's and Tsunade are screwy along with the fact that Tsunade is a cousin and not Hashirama's granddaughter. If anyone is confused refer back to the notes at the bottom of Chapter 1 for an explanation please and thank you!


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Customary reminder that I am not a doctor ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯

“Madara told me that you were a trauma surgeon now, Naminé. How is that? Do you work crazy forty-eight hour shifts?” Tsunade asked during dinner.

Tobirama’s hand clenched around his glass at the mention of Madara. He hated the fact that Naminé met up with the guy and didn’t even mention it to him. Sure, they were just sort of coexisting at his house and not really talking a whole lot, but how could Naminé think that her meeting up with Madara wasn’t something significant enough to tell him about?

“Nah,” Naminé said. “The longest shift I’ve ever worked was a little over thirty hours, and that was just during residency. Now that I’m an attending it’s not so bad.”

“I can’t imagine working that much,” Tsunade said.

“It’s high adrenaline, so it doesn’t feel too terrible,” Naminé remarked as she took a sip of her wine.

“Says the adrenaline junkie,” Toka commented.

“Why does everyone say that? I’m not an adrenaline junkie,” Naminé said with a light laugh.

Hashirama snorted along with both Toka and Tsunade. Naminé’s eyes flickered to Tobirama, silently asking him to defend her, but Tobirama just smirked and took a sip of his water to avoid having to say anything. She could get herself out of this one.

“You snuck out every single weekend back in high school,” Toka deadpanned.

“Everyone sneaks out at that age,” Naminé deflected with a wave of her hand.

“I know when you went on that service trip in college that you went on that sketchy zip line despite your professor telling you not to. Asami said that thing looked like it was going to snap if you breathed on it wrong,” Hashirama said with a big grin on his face.

“You let Madara convince you into spending the night by yourself at that freaky house that everyone said was haunted when we were kids,” Toka said.

“You also took me cliff diving once,” Tsunade tacked on.

“All right, all right!” Naminé held her hands up.

“Tobirama, you’ve got to have some pretty good examples of Naminé’s poor decision making. Why don’t you share with us?” Hashirama said. He patted Tobirama on his shoulder since he was next to him at the table, eliciting a sigh from his brother.

“He does not,” Naminé said. She looked at Tobirama with wide eyes and her cheeks flushed with embarrassment.

“If anyone has reckless Naminé stories it’s you,” Tsunade looked at him expectantly and Tobirama set his glass down.

He didn’t actually have that many stories because he used to scold her all the time whenever she got a stupid idea in her head like anything aforementioned. He remembered when she broke her arm after jumping off of the roof and onto a trampoline because Izuna Uchiha said she wouldn’t do it, and even though they were pretty young when it happened, Tobirama still had gone off on her for being so careless.

The other things that he once let Naminé trick him into doing weren’t even remotely appropriate for this conversation either. And judging from the way her face was burning red and how she tried to busy herself by downing her wine, she thought the same thing and remembered them all too well.

“I don’t have any stories,” he said.

Toka scoffed hard, “yes you do. I’ve heard them all before.”

Tobirama shot a scowl at Naminé. He didn’t think he wanted to know what exactly Toka, his goddamn _cousin_ , knew about them. And the way Naminé was trying to make herself as inconspicuous as possible only vindicated his feelings on the subject even more.

“Come on, Tobirama. Fill me in. I didn’t get to live through all of this and I’d like to hear some funny stories,” Mito pushed with a big smile on her face.

He groaned, “really. I don’t have any—”

“Didn’t you two break into your high school’s swimming pool one night?” Tsunade had a wicked smirk on her face when spoke, leaning on her hand and looking between him and Naminé.

“We didn’t really _break in_. I had a key…” Naminé trailed off when Tobirama glared at her.

“Trust me, that’s not the only thing they did that night,” Toka said under her breath.

“Oh my God,” Naminé murmured, putting her hand to her forehead and looking down at the table so she wouldn’t have to look at anyone else. She looked completely mortified and Tobirama absolutely understood the sentiment.

“ _Toka_ ,” he hissed. How the actual fuck his private business got dragged into this, he didn’t know, but he didn’t appreciate it at all. They were all eating for Christ’s sake, and the stupid things he did with Naminé as a teenager should have remained in the past and just between them, not casually brought up during _family dinner_.

“Tobirama, I am shocked that you would do something so risqué,” Mito said through fits of giggles.

Tobirama pinched the bridge of his nose. This wasn’t happening. There was no goddamn way this was happening right now.

“You didn’t know my brother back then,” Hashirama said, and Tobirama could hear that stupid grin in his brother’s voice. “All it took was one look from Naminé and then he would go along with any of her half-baked schemes.”

“Hey, my schemes were fully baked thank you very much,” Naminé said as she pulled her hand away from her face and glowered weakly at Hashirama.

“So that night on the beach was fully baked?” Toka teased.

Tobirama’s eyes widened and he gave Naminé another freezing cold glare. _What the fuck?_ Did she tell Toka _everything_ they did when they were younger?

Naminé’s jaw went slack as she looked at Toka in betrayal.

“Night on the beach?” Tsunade leaned forward and grinned at Toka mischievously. “Oh my.”

Naminé’s eyes couldn’t have gotten any wider if she tried, and she risked a look at where Tobirama was still focusing a glare on her.

“Stop looking at me like that,” she squeaked.

Hashirama’s laughter boomed in his ear as he patted Tobirama on the back, “you were much more of a risk taker back then.”

Tobirama was going to kill Naminé first and then he was going to kill Toka.

But before anyone could push the subject any further, there was a loud buzzing sound coming from the insufferable woman herself.

Tobirama watched Naminé pull her pager off of her belt loop and read the message on the little screen. Her forehead creased in concentration and then she got up from the table, giving Mito an apologetic smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes.

“I’m so sorry to leave in the middle of dinner, but I have to go to the hospital right now.”

“Oh no, that’s okay. Don’t feel bad,” Mito assured. “I’m glad you came.”

“Just when things were getting fun too,” Tsunade started. She stood up and hugged Naminé for a brief moment, “don’t be a stranger, okay?”

Tobirama could see every visible line of tension in Naminé’s neck and shoulders, probably taken aback at the sentiment in Tsunade’s voice.

“Thanks for having me. I really appreciate it,” she said quickly, looking between both Hashirama and Mito.

“Do you want me to walk you out?” Tobirama asked. He knew that it was already dark out and if he was being honest with himself, he didn’t want her walking out there alone with what he knew about her stalker, and that wasn’t much.

“…Are you sure?” She asked. She was fiddling with the sleeves of her sweater again.

“Yes. I need to get away from these people,” Tobirama said. He stood up from the table, ignoring the look of surprise on Toka and Tsunade’s face, as well as the smirk that was curling onto his brother’s.

“Aw, we were just having some fun,” Tsunade said.

“Let him go. We’ll have more fun when he comes back,” Hashirama smirked harder, if that was even possible, and left it at that. Tobirama rolled his eyes and looked at Naminé.

“Come on,” he said.

He walked Naminé to the door and rubbed his eyes as she shouldered her jacket on, not even bothering to don his own.

“I’ve never been so happy to get a page before in my life,” Naminé muttered as she opened the door.

Tobirama was close behind her and crossed his arms against the chill outside, “I can’t believe you told Toka those things.”

Naminé shot him a half hearted glare over her shoulder, “I was seventeen and she was my best friend. Sue me.”

He hated that he was so embarrassed at the thought of Toka knowing all of those stories, stories that really should have been kept between him and Naminé, hidden away until he could forget about them, but there wasn’t a whole lot he could do about it. He couldn’t really scold her for something she did years ago.

“What else did you tell her?” Tobirama asked, mainly because he wanted to brace himself for whatever the hell else he was going to walk into when he went back inside, and also partly because he was curious.

Naminé smirked when she got to her car and opened the door of the driver’s side, “you don’t want to know.”

“Naminé,” he complained, “did it ever occur to you that I didn’t want my cousin knowing those things?”

She shrugged, “to be fair, it was a mutual thing. I told her things and she told me things. Your cousin’s a freak.”

Tobirama groaned, “stop. I don’t want to hear anything else.”

She laughed, a warm sound that made him feel like he was in a simpler time and made his chest tighten with nostalgia.

“You really don’t.”

He sighed and kept his arms crossed, neither of them really saying anything as she stood against her door.

“Um,” she looked down and tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “I don’t know when I’ll be back. I’ll try to be quiet when I come in.”

He nodded. He was probably going to be awake doing work anyway since on Monday he and Hashirama would start interviewing candidates to be Konoha Enterprises’ new chief legal counsel.

“Be safe,” he said.

She smirked, “oh are you worried?”

He almost wanted to laugh as he shook his head, “if I say I am will you be careful?”

“Cross my heart,” she was smiling now, and even in the dim light coming from one of the streetlamps, he could see small crinkles at the corners of her eyes that told him it was the real thing and not some poor attempt to pacify him.

Putting his pride to the side for just a moment, Tobirama decided to indulge her and said a quick, “then I’m worried.”

He doubted that she could grin any harder when she said, “then I’ll be careful.”

Tobirama scoffed, but he wasn’t actually all that annoyed. Not really anyway. If anything he was a little amused. “Insufferable woman.”

“Yeah yeah. Deep down you like me,” she said, getting into the driver’s seat with a smug smirk on her pretty face.

Tobirama didn’t say anything. He just shook his head quietly and closed the door for her.

Then she pulled out of the driveway and headed off to the hospital.

He stood outside for a moment, rubbing the back of his neck and rolling out his sore shoulders.

_‘Deep down you like me’_

Yeah. Yeah he guessed she was right. Maybe deep down he did still like her, and if not, then at the very least still found her mildly amusing.

He would just never admit it out loud.

* * *

“I can’t find the source of the bleeding,” Naminé’s voice was muffled through her mask, but Asami could still hear the concern there. Asami kept her arms crossed, keeping her hands in the sterile field as she watched the fetal monitor.

“You better find it soon or else I’m going to need to perform an emergency C-section,” Asami warned, counting the minutes that the child could survive the stress.

“You are not to cut into her until I say you can, Dr. Matsuo,” Naminé warned, her voice eerily calm. Asami’s eyes narrowed and she looked across the table to where Naminé was still trying to find the source of the woman’s bleeding.

Naminé’s face went the color of ash the very second she had stepped into the OR and saw the woman’s injuries. She had stared at the deep swirling gashes on the patient’s body in horror, and it wasn’t until Kagami got her attention did Naminé actually snap out of it and begin the procedure.

Asami couldn’t figure out why Naminé reacted the way she did, but figured that the only reason had to be that she had seen those brutal injuries on someone else before.

“If I have to perform a C-section to get that baby out alive then I’m doing it,” Asami warned.

“I need another unit,” Naminé said, her voice tight. “And yes, Dr. Matsuo. If you need to perform a C-section to get the baby out alive that’s fine, but you will wait for my go.”

Asami glared, her eyes resting on Naminé’s black scrub cap with white roses. She knew damn well where Naminé got that scrub cap, and the fact that she had the nerve to wear it after leaving the man who gave it to her in the cruelest way imaginable just pissed Asami off to no end.

She didn’t deserve to have it.

“Dr. Nakano, her BP is dropping,” Kagami said, working as well to stop the bleeding where he could find it.

“How many units has she had?”

“This is twelve.”

Asami’s eyes snapped back to the fetal monitor and she seethed.

“Naminé, I need to get that baby out,” Asami warned.

“Just wait a second, if you cut into her now she’s going to hemorrhage even worse and we’re not going to be able to replace the blood fast enough,” Naminé snapped.

Asami watched the monitor and shook her head. Unless Naminé could pull off a miracle and find the source of the bleeding and stop it in the next two seconds, the woman was going to die and take the baby along with her. It was time.

“I’m going ahead with the C-section,” Asami stated, looking over her shoulder and nodding at one of her residents.

“Dr. Matsuo, you are not to cut into her! Do you understand?” Naminé barked.

Asami gritted her teeth. Naminé was a trauma surgeon, not a neonatal surgeon. And Asami wouldn’t let this baby die on her watch, not when the baby’s mother was already too far gone.

Asami didn’t listen and went forward with it, making an incision in the woman’s abdomen and then another in her uterus.

“ _Dr. Matsuo!_ ” Naminé snapped, sounding much harsher than Asami had ever heard before in her life.

Asami ignored her. She knew she should have listened to Naminé, because when it came to traumas she was the one Asami actually had to listen to, but she had to get the baby out alive. Could it have waited another minute? Maybe. But the woman wasn’t going to make it and if she didn’t, then the baby might not have either.

“She’s hemorrhaging again,” Kagami said, sounding much more calm than Asami expected.

Another moment later and Asami had the baby out and suctioned the baby’s nose and mouth, and then handed the newborn to the resident beside her.

Naminé cursed and started barking about needing to stop the bleeding, already having clamped certain smaller arteries and cauterized others, but it didn’t do much good since Naminé still hadn’t found the main bleeder, and the C-section did nothing to help with that.

Then just like that, the monitor flat lined and the OR was dead silent with the exception of the woman’s baby who finally started crying. The patient was gone, having lost too much blood for them to be able to keep up with, and Asami didn’t think she could bear to look at Naminé, so she tried to look at Kagami instead, but his eyes were only on the patient.

Deciding it was worth the risk, Asami’s eyes flashed towards Naminé and saw her eyes squeezed shut, her bloodied hands clenching into fists.

The silence stretched on, horrifically loud and smothering, and just when Asami had enough and went to call it, Naminé beat her to it.

“Time of death: 9:22.”

Asami looked at Kagami, but he shook his head when she did. He sighed and pulled his mask off, standing there for a moment to probably compose himself.

Asami went over to her resident to make sure the baby was okay and then told her to get the baby to the NICU immediately.

She took slow, heavy steps over to the sink where Naminé was scrubbing her hands and arms vigorously, her mask already having been removed.

“Naminé,” Asami said softly.

“Don’t talk to me,” Naminé said, her voice harsher than probably even Tobirama’s.

Asami rolled her eyes, pulled her mask off, and began to wash her hands, “I had to get the baby out.”

“No, you had to go against what I said because you hate me and wanted to be right,” Naminé hissed.

“I would never put my personal feelings above one of my patients,” Asami said, feeling heat bloom through her chest as she got angrier and angrier.

“Then why did you cut into her when I specifically told you not to?” Naminé asked, almost shouting at her as she reeled on Asami with eyes the size of saucers.

“Because that child was going to die,” Asami said back, her voice starting to rise too.

“No. That baby would have been fine for another two minutes. You just wanted to make a point because you thought you knew best!”

“Because when it comes to pregnant women I do know best!” Asami snapped.

“It doesn’t matter!” Naminé snarled. “I’m the trauma specialist here. I’m the one who spent my fellowship learning how to prioritize these things so I can address what needs to be addressed first! It is _your_ fault that baby doesn’t have a mother! _Yours_.”

Asami shook her head, her body shaking with fury, “I had to make a judgment call to make sure that baby came out alive. So get the hell off your high horse because you’re not the only one here who did a fellowship.”

It was that exact moment that Naminé blew up.

“I DON’T CARE!” She yelled, earning surprised looks from every single person in the OR. “When it comes to traumas _I’m_ the one in charge! Me! Not you! _Me!_ You cut into a woman who was already hemorrhaging and pushed her over the edge!”

Asami couldn’t help it when she blew up next, “YOU COULDN’T FIND THE SOURCE OF THE BLEEDING.”

“IF YOU HAD JUST GIVEN ME ANOTHER MINUTE BEFORE YOU CUT INTO HER AND MADE HER HEMORRHAGE EVEN MORE I COULD HAVE FOUND IT, YOU _STUPID BITCH_.”

Asami’s jaw fell open as she gaped at the trauma surgeon in front of her.

Naminé didn’t say anything after that, she just stormed out in a fit of rage.

The stillness in the room was enough to crush Asami and she looked down at the floor, wanting to just bury her head in the sand. Whether or not she thought Naminé was right didn’t really matter, because now this was twice the two of them got in each other’s faces around their colleagues. Asami would have been willing to bet that the story of what just happened would have found its way all around the hospital by morning.

“Dr. Matsuo,” it was Kagami, who came to hesitantly stand beside her.

“It’s fine, Dr. Uchiha,” Asami said tightly. “Naminé has never been good when it came to losing her patients. Frankly, it’s a little disheartening to see her act that way as an attending.”

“Sure,” Kagami murmured, clearly not agreeing with her.

“Now if you’ll excuse me,” Asami left the OR and went into the closest bathroom to clear her head.

But as luck would have it, Naminé was also in there, her arms braced against the sink, her head drooped low between her shoulders, and breathing hard enough for Asami to think that she was hyperventilating.

“Naminé,” Asami said, pausing in the door.

Naminé’s eyes met hers through the mirror and the blonde woman looked down again without saying another word.

Asami pursed her lips into a thin line and crossed her arms, “if this is still your reaction to a patient’s death then you need help. It’s part of our profession and—”

“That’s not it,” Naminé hissed between heavy breaths. She squeezed her eyes shut and sucked in quick and shallow breaths.

“Okay, then what is it?” Asami asked. She didn’t really care what Naminé’s problem was. But she did care what her colleagues thought about her, and if they all thought Asami was the crazy one and Naminé was the innocent one in all of this, then Asami would have lost her goddamn mind. So she figured she might as well try and play nice before things got even uglier.

“I can’t breathe,” Naminé whimpered out between breaths.

Asami narrowed her eyes and walked a little closer, “the fact that you just told me you can’t breathe proves that you can.”

“I can’t,” Asami could see tears in Naminé’s eyes as her breathing only quickened. “I-I can’t breathe.”

“What the hell is the matter with you?” Asami said with her eyebrows knitting together in complete confusion.

Naminé’s face was red as she cried and choked on her own shallow breaths. Asami frowned, not sure what exactly was causing all of this, but decided to be the bigger person and actually help.

“Naminé, you’re having a panic attack,” Asami said, coming to stand beside the trauma surgeon. “Come on, take deep breaths.”

She shook her head and choked on another breath again and Asami sighed, “come on, Naminé. Breathe with me.”

Asami hesitantly put a hand on Naminé’s shoulder and breathed in for four long seconds, held it for another second, and then exhaled for another four long seconds. She did it a few more times until Naminé followed suit, eventually taking in slow deep breaths. And after enough times, she could breathe easier and her face wasn’t so red.

“Thanks,” Naminé murmured as she looked away from Asami.

Asami removed her hand and crossed her arms, “yeah… Guess I’m not such a stupid bitch after all, huh?”

Naminé’s eyes, the same eyes that were a unique color cross somewhere between honey topaz and brandy, locked with Asami’s ice blue ones.

“I shouldn’t have yelled at you,” Naminé said in a very low voice.

Asami wanted to scoff, but for sake of keeping up appearances, she refrained, “you think?”

“But you should have listened to me.”

This time Asami couldn’t hold in her scoff, “all right then.”

“…I’m glad you got the baby out,” Naminé muttered, albeit rather begrudgingly.

“Me too,” Asami said.

She looked at Naminé, taking a second to take in the petite’s woman’s appearance. There was once a time where Asami would have killed for Naminé’s looks. She just always had people looking at her, with what used to be her long blonde hair, insanely colored eyes, and confident smirks. But the woman in front of her now wasn’t the same woman who left nine years ago. Sure, she just ripped Asami a new one in the OR, but that was out of anger. Not out of confidence like when they were teenagers or in their early twenties.

There was just something missing from the woman in front of her, and Asami couldn’t figure out what.

“If we’re going to be colleagues we shouldn’t constantly be at each other’s throats,” Naminé said.

Asami sighed. Naminé was right, and she absolutely hated that.

“Let’s just start fresh, okay? I’m so goddamn tired of fighting,” Naminé tacked on when Asami was quiet.

Asami crossed her arms and gave it some serious thought. Their whole rivalry started when they were just girls and hung around the Senju’s as kids. Naminé had moved to the neighborhood block before she did and liked being the only girl, so they just developed a rivalry naturally. It’s not like there was an event that triggered it all. It was just them being kids and Naminé getting annoyed that there was another girl hanging around, and Asami getting annoyed that Naminé and Toka would never include her.

Neither of them had meant for that rivalry to continue on into middle school, high school, university, and even med school. It was just so hard not to when Naminé seemed to get everything she wanted.

Fine, Asami may have been prom queen in high school, and sure, maybe she was homecoming queen in university, but none of that felt like a real victory at the time. Naminé had more friends, she was closer with professors, she did better on their exams in medical school, had better recommendations, the whole works.

And to add insult to injury, during all of this, every time Asami hung around the Senju’s she had been forced to see Naminé and Tobirama together.

Asami hated Naminé for it growing up. Absolutely hated her guts. And it only got worse because they never once broke up, and then boom, before Asami knew it, Naminé had a ring on her finger coming back from winter break in their third year of med school.

And the worst part? She didn’t even go through with the goddamn marriage. Asami had to sit back and watch Naminé be with the guy that Asami loved her entire life, and then had to watch Naminé leave him the day of their goddamn wedding, seemingly without reason.

If Asami had hated Naminé before, then she absolutely despised her after that.

It just wasn’t fair. She got everything Asami ever wanted and threw it all away.

But in that moment, looking at the blonde trauma surgeon in front of her, who was so very clearly broken into a thousand goddamn pieces and probably held together with scotch tape, and asking for a truce, Asami actually wanted to be the bigger person. Because for once in her life, Naminé didn’t have everything she wanted. She didn’t have more friends, she didn’t have better looks, and she didn’t have Tobirama. For once, things were working out in Asami’s favor.

And you know what? Call her petty, but she liked it.

“Truce?” Naminé asked, holding her hand out.

Asami’s upper lip curled but she eventually took the woman’s hand.

“Truce.”

* * *

Naminé wanted one thing after that surgery and after her conversation with Asami, and that was something for her back. Her fingers just itched for something to help the pain there, but she didn’t want to take a Percocet for it, not when she didn’t have a whole lot left.

So when she got back to Tobirama’s a little after ten, she just knew she didn’t want to sit alone on the sofa with her thoughts, because if she did she absolutely would have resorted to taking some of her pills, and she really didn’t want to do that.

She walked up to the front door and grabbed the spare key that was in a lockbox on the side of the house, and went inside. She hung her coat up and left her workbag on the floor by the entrance, a little too tired to carry it upstairs to the spare bathroom, and walked deeper into the house.

Naminé couldn’t stop thinking about that woman’s injuries no matter how hard she tried. The woman had the same gashes on her that Naminé had, the big swooping ones that probably came from a type of scythe. And Naminé didn’t know if it was Hidan who attacked the woman, but at the very least it had to be someone from the same cult. Otherwise why else would she have almost the exact same injuries as Naminé?

It wasn’t even the fact that the woman died which triggered Naminé’s panic attack, it was the fact that had one of Naminé’s fellow doctors not found her that night, then she would have probably also died.

She would have died alone with no friends, no family, and nothing to show for her life except for having an MD next to her name.

At least Asami was able to deliver the woman’s baby.

God, she felt useless.

Naminé sighed and saw light from the kitchen, knowing that Tobirama was probably working at the table in there. She debated going upstairs and changing out of her scrubs first, since after her panic attack and conversation with Asami she really didn’t feel like changing into street clothes before she left, but ended up deciding that it could wait.

She just didn’t want to be alone with her thoughts any longer.

“Do you ever stop working?” Naminé asked as she entered the kitchen, plunging her hands into the pockets of her scrubs and fiddling with her scrub cap that was in there.

Tobirama’s red eyes looked up at her from his computer, sweeping over her frame once before settling back on her face, “says the woman who just got back from work.”

Naminé shrugged and instead of sitting down across from him at the table, she walked over to the island and quickly hoisted herself up on it to sit there instead.

“I have chairs for a reason,” Tobirama said, though his voice was lacking its usual bite.

“I wanted to sit here,” she said back.

“You mean you wanted to be difficult,” he went back to reading something on his computer and Naminé smiled softly to herself. He had his glasses on and she wanted to tease him for it, not because she didn’t like them, but because she knew he absolutely hated wearing them.

“You look so diligent with your glasses,” she said with a smirk.

Tobirama sighed and looked at her again, “how was the hospital?”

She almost laughed when he blatantly disregarded her comment, and she might have if she felt better about everything.

“My patient died,” she admitted.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” he said, and he genuinely did sound sympathetic.

She reached her hand back and pulled out the elastic that was holding her hair back in a short little ponytail for surgery, and ran her fingers through it, letting her hair down.

“Me too… And then I might have called Asami a stupid bitch to her face afterwards.”

Tobirama frowned and chided her with a stern, “Naminé.”

She looked down at her fingers. Her fingernails and cuticles were picked raw, so there wasn’t much to pick at, so she opted for rubbing her hands together and sitting up a little straighter, “I don’t know what you and Hashirama see in her.”

Tobirama actually shut his laptop to give her more of his attention, “she says the same thing about you.”

Naminé snorted, “don’t tell me you guys still talk to her. I know she’s delivering Hashirama’s baby but—”

“Hashirama considers her family,” Tobirama said before she could go on a rant.

“And you?” She pressed, suddenly feel very self conscious about the woman with dark hair and ice blue eyes.

“Doesn’t matter what I think,” he said easily. Naminé narrowed her eyes. It was like Tobirama to be evasive when he was either uncomfortable with something or thought you made a stupid point that didn’t deserve a response, but if he was perfectly fine with it, then he was straight forward and blunt. There was nothing in his posture that made her think he was uncomfortable or on edge, or even that he thought she made a stupid point, so his evasive answer bothered her for some reason.

“What does that mean?”

He sighed, “you look tired. You should go to sleep.”

That bothered her even more, but she didn’t want to keep talking about Asami or even think about her for that matter, so she reluctantly let it go.

“I can’t sleep right now,” she muttered. The thought of the woman’s injuries made bile rise in her throat, and she didn’t think she’d be able to fall asleep with that image behind her eyes. The more she thought about it, the more she thought how easily the woman on the table could have been her.

Tobirama actually smirked at her, small and barely noticeable, but still there. “Am I to entertain you then?”

There was something in his voice that lifted her spirits, if only a little.

“If you think you can manage,” she said as she raised her chin.

She couldn’t help it when a smile snuck onto her face at the sound of him chuckling quietly under his breath, “and how would you like me to do that?”

“Give me something to fix. It’ll make me feel like my $200,000 med school education wasn’t a waste,” she said right away.

“Unless you can get me a new chief legal counsel, there’s nothing I have that you can fix,” he told her, leaning back into his chair and holding her in a steady gaze that made her skin feel hot.

Naminé gave him a dramatic sigh, “damn. No dislocated fingers I can pop back in?”

Tobirama actually looked amused as he crossed his arms and smirked a little at her, “unfortunately, no.”

“Well then you’re not doing a very good job of entertaining me,” she remarked. He gave her a long look, one that was still amused for some reason, and then opened his computer back up. Naminé narrowed her eyes and said, “what about your shoulders?”

“What about them?” He didn’t even look at her as he spoke, already too buried in his work again.

“Well they’re sore, aren’t they? I can fix that,” she pressed, jumping down from the counter and watching him with expectant eyes.

Tobirama was back to normal cranky self in an instant, glaring at her and saying a firm, “no.”

“Why not? I’m feeling useless because I lost my patient and I need to fix something. You have sore shoulders and I can fix that. Problem solved.”

Tobirama was frowning at her now, “don’t you have something on yourself you can fix?”

Naminé shook her head, “I’m in excellent health.”

He scoffed, “and your back?”

“Okay well I would need an orthopedic surgeon for that,” she said easily. “Come on. I can just see the tension in your neck and shoulders. Let me help.”

He narrowed his eyes, “maybe I’m just a tense person and don’t want any help.”

She couldn’t help it when a loud laugh came over her, “well you are a tense person, but you can’t fool me. I know you’re sore.”

She didn’t wait for Tobirama to say anything else. She knew after growing up with him and being with him for a number of years that sometimes you had to just take charge with him, otherwise you’d be stuck in a state of limbo with the stubborn man indefinitely.

Naminé stood behind him and put her hands on his shoulders.

“Naminé,” he warned.

“Just pretend like I’m not here,” she said, not at all bothered by his attitude. He grunted something under his breath that she couldn’t hear, but she was fairly certain it was something along the lines of how insufferable she was and she snickered, “relax. I’m not going to bite you.”

He huffed and looked at his computer, probably trying to glare a hole into the screen. She started to massage his shoulders and then said under her breath, “you’re the biter after all.”

“ _Naminé_ ,” Tobirama turned in the chair to scowl at her and she couldn’t help the laughter that rippled through her body.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she held her stomach as she continued to laugh. “I couldn’t help myself.”

He rubbed his eyes and huffed, “I have work to do and you’re distracting me.”

She quirked her eyebrows upward but continued to massage her thumbs into his shoulders, “I’m just trying to alleviate some of the tension. I mean really. I’m amazed you can get anything done with how stiff you are.”

He didn’t say anything to her but he did roll his eyes in exasperation and opened a document up on his laptop and began reading over it, occasionally making highlights and leaving comments in the margins as he did.

But he didn’t give her a hard time anymore, he just let her rub away the tension. He probably figured there was no point in arguing with her about it anymore since she clearly was not going to take no for an answer.

Naminé smiled to herself in victory as she rubbed her thumbs in small circles along his neck and shoulders, working out the kinks there. In another life, this was something they did on the regular because Tobirama was a terrible sleeper, and unless he was on his stomach with his arms folded over his head, he couldn’t sleep at all. That or he either had to hug something when he slept—though he would deny that until the end of time. So when they were together, Naminé would often rub his shoulders at night while he either worked on his stuff for law school or helped Hashirama with Konoha Enterprises.

She could feel him relax the more she rubbed his shoulders and bit down on the inside of her cheek. Part of her hated how easy it was for them to fall back into such an old habit and she hated herself for being so bold, but another part of her, a softer and more affectionate part, almost wished she had done it sooner.

God, she really was pathetic wasn’t she?

When she had to move back, she was bound and determined to avoid any and all contact with anyone who had the surname Senju. Her father used to say you could only go forward, not backward. And she knew damn well that if he saw her today he would have ripped into her and said she was careless by associating with them after she left. He would have said that if she left in the first place then she had no business coming back, and if she had to, then she should have known better than to try and turn back time.

She really hadn’t meant to get involved with the Senju’s again. Honestly.

It wasn’t her fault that Mito just happened to take a fall on the day Naminé decided to help down in the ED. It wasn’t her fault that Hashirama was so goddamn determined to meet up with her again. It wasn’t her fault that Hidan stalked her all the way to another city and broke into her car and her house.

But it _was_ her fault that she called Tobirama that first night.

Sure, she didn’t have anyone else to call, but she could have always taken refuge in a hotel or something.

She always had poor decision making skills when it came to him.

Tobirama then grunted and pulled her out of her thoughts.

“Sorry,” she said, withdrawing her hands for a second. “Too hard?”

He shook his head, “you’re fine.”

She placed her hands back on his shoulders, massaging the same spot that made him grunt and felt him tense again.

“You’ve got a knot here,” she said, careful to have a softer touch.

“Mm,” he mumbled, still too absorbed in his work.

She rubbed her thumb in a small circular motion over the tender spot and he tensed again, but after a few more moments he let out a soft sigh and she felt the tension temporarily leave his shoulders.

“Better?”

His tone was light when he said, “I’m not going to give you the satisfaction by saying yes.”

She smirked, “that’s okay, you don’t need to. I can already feel how much more relaxed you are.”

“Try not to sound so smug,” he said.

She bit down on her bottom lip to hold in a smile, “see? You should have let me do this the other night. I bet you would have slept a lot better.”

She pulled her hands back when he suddenly slid his chair away from the table and stood up, walking directly over to the kitchen window and looking outside.

“What is it?” She asked.

She could see his eyes narrowing and a small crease appear in his forehead. The look of concentration on his face made Naminé begin to pick at her fingernails.

“Is something wrong?” She asked again when he didn’t say anything.

Tobirama leaned away from the window very slowly and looked at Naminé, “why don’t you sleep upstairs tonight?”

She blinked dumbly, “why?”

He frowned and crossed his arms, “just for tonight.”

He wasn’t fooling her. She crossed her own arms and glared at him, “why? What’s wrong?”

Tobirama rubbed his forehead with his thumb and looked like he was contemplating something, but before he could say anything, the doorbell rang.

His eyes widened for a fraction of a second and he immediately left the kitchen to get the door.

Naminé was suddenly itching for a Percocet again and she crossed her arms over her chest as a way of almost shielding herself and followed Tobirama to the front door. When she got to the hallway he had already opened up the door, and she could see that he was pulled as taut as a string when there was no one there.

Something wasn’t right.

She walked up behind him and heard him suck in a sharp breath through his teeth.

“What? What is it?” She asked, following him outside.

“Go back inside,” he said.

“No, what did you see?” She demanded.

He didn’t have to answer her because Naminé’s eyes landed on her car in the driveway and she sucked in a breath, covering her mouth with her hand.

Her windshield had been smashed, the cracks in the glass looking like spider webs as they fanned out over the entirety of the windshield.

“Naminé, go inside,” Tobirama ordered.

“My car—”

“ _Go inside_ ,” he barked.

She didn’t have it in her to argue with him, so she just bit down on her lip and turned around and went in the house, closing the door behind her.

She paced in the entry hall and started to bite down on her nails when picking at them wasn’t enough to calm her nerves. And if she wasn’t so scared out of her goddamn mind, she would have run upstairs and swallowed all of the remaining Percocet she had left.

At least three minutes or so went by before Tobirama came back inside, locking the front door with his face screwed up in concentration.

“It’s because trial starts in a week,” Naminé told him with a quivering voice. “He warned me to drop the case,” she added, remembering the day she walked out to her car to look for her scrub cap and instead found Hidan’s initial threat on her windshield, telling her to drop the case or else he’d do it again.

Tobirama gave a heavy sigh and he put his hand to the back of his neck, “what time do you have to be at work tomorrow?”

She blinked a few times when her eyes started to get hot, “I have to start rounds by seven.”

He nodded, “I’ll drive you.”

She didn’t feel better, and she just stood there, alternating between staring at the floor and staring at him as she chewed her fingernails down.

Breaking into her car wasn’t enough, and breaking into her house wasn’t enough. Now the bastard followed her to Tobirama’s and busted up her car. What the hell was he going to do next? Was he going to break into the house and finish the job? Was he going to show up at the hospital and pretend to be a patient so he could kill her?

“Why don’t you sleep upstairs tonight?” Tobirama said again. He didn’t look shaken up or upset, just tired, and she could appreciate that. At least when she was ready to jump off a cliff and all hell broke loose _someone_ was steady. But then again, Tobirama was always steady. He had been since he was just a boy.

She shook her head but didn’t say anything.

Tobirama walked a little closer to her, “for my sanity, Naminé.”

She pursed her lips and crossed her arms as tight across herself as possible, “you could just take me to the hospital now and I’ll sleep in the on call room. I’ve done it before and that way Hidan isn’t lurking around here.”

She was pretty sure it was the first time she said his name around Tobirama, and she noticed the way his eyes flashed, registering the name and remembering it.

“I won’t ask you again,” he said.

Naminé inhaled sharply through her nose and rubbed her temples. She didn’t stand a chance when it came to Tobirama having made up his mind and she knew that. And to be frank, the idea of sleeping alone in the living room with all of those windows made her hair stand on edge.

But so did the idea of sleeping alone upstairs.

“I… I don’t…” She couldn’t say it. Not to him.

So she turned away from him without finishing her sentence and went upstairs, stopping in the spare bathroom to change into a pair of shorts and a hoodie. She checked the time and saw that it was getting late and felt a wave of guilt crash over her. Tobirama had work to do and she needed to sleep so she was cognizant enough to able to take care of her patients in the morning.

A few Percocet would have helped knock her out, but she decided against it when she saw that she was getting a little low. Not enough for her to start wigging out, but enough to make her think twice before she carelessly swallowed them.

So she instead opted for taking one instead of three.

She walked to the bedroom and sat on the edge of the bed, pulling her knees up to her chest and resting her chin on them.

Maybe this was her punishment for leaving all those years ago. If she had stayed none of this shit ever would have happened. She would have been married, maybe she would have had a couple of kids running around, who knows.

But she probably wouldn’t have had a psychotic stalker trying to kill her.

She groaned and got up, walking over to the window that faced the front of the house and looked down at her car. As far as she could tell, only the windshield was shattered, but for all she knew it could have been keyed too since Tobirama didn’t let her get close enough to see for herself.

There was a knock on the door and Naminé hated the fact that she was so nervous she actually jumped.

“Yeah,” she said, putting her hand to her chest and trying to force herself to calm down.

Tobirama walked in, and in the dim light from the lamp on the end table she could see the circles under his eyes that gave away just how tired he was.

“I’m sorry, I just needed to get some things.”

“No you’re fine,” she said. “I’m the one who should be apologizing for taking your room.”

“Because I told you to,” Tobirama said. He went to his closet and grabbed a few things, and Naminé kept her eyes on his back as he did. His shoulders didn’t seem so stiff, at least not right now.

At least that was one good thing she did today.

“Did you see anything when you were outside?” She asked, walking away from the window and going to sit down on the bed.

“Nothing for you to worry about,” he said easily.

She frowned and brought her knees to her chest once again and brought her arms around them.

“I hate when you do this,” she muttered.

“Do what?” Tobirama asked, turning back around with a set of clothes in his hands.

“When you get all protective and keep me in the dark,” she said. It was his MO anytime something was going on that caused him to get protective. He would just shoulder anything and everything he could, and then refuse to mention what he knew to whoever it was he was trying to protect. Whether if it was her, Hashirama, Tsunade, literally anyone. It was always the same.

“I’m not. There was nothing that you needed to worry about,” he said, his eyes completely focused on where she sat on his bed.

Naminé rubbed her hands together and looked down at them, “I know you saw something.”

“You need to go to sleep.”

She directed a glare at him, “stop ignoring me.”

Tobirama sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, “believe me, Naminé. I couldn’t ignore you even if I wanted to.”

For whatever reason, his words made her heart skip a beat and she immediately wanted to scold herself for feeling like that. She needed to stop getting so flustered around him. She just needed to get a hold of herself.

So she did what she was best at. Be a giant sarcastic pain in the ass.

“So you _don’t_ want to ignore me?” She tried, though she knew she didn’t sound nearly as smug or sarcastic as she wished she had. If anything she just sounded weak.

He groaned, “you’re impossible.”

She sighed, and under normal circumstances would have smirked at him or teased him or something in between, but she just hugged her knees and let her eyes fall to the floor.

“I know,” she muttered.

Maybe he felt bad, or maybe he was actually a little worried, or maybe he just had a momentary lapse of judgment, but Tobirama didn’t walk away from her. He just stood there for a moment and scratched the back of his head.

“Do you need anything?” he finally said.

Naminé’s eyes flickered up to him and was actually surprised to see that he wasn’t looking at her. He was looking at the floor instead.

That was the moment that she was assaulted by a heavy wave of nostalgia. She had been starting to get used to it, remembering a time years ago when things were easier, but sitting there alone in his bedroom with him made her realize just how badly she missed him and just how futile her attempts to suppress those feelings had been.

She had tried to smother those thoughts when she left, and hadn’t even been successful in doing so until about five years had passed. Those feelings were the main reason why she had wanted to stay away from any and all of the Senju’s when she moved back. But she couldn’t hold them off any longer.

She missed him. She wanted him. She wanted to be able to put her arms around him and kiss away the pain she put him through all those years ago.

She just wanted him so much that it hurt.

“You could stay,” she said, her voice so incredibly soft that she wasn’t even sure if she heard herself or not.

“Naminé…” Her name was nothing more than a breath on his lips, a soft, barely audible sound that hurt worse than a knife to the heart. She risked a look at him and his eyes were closed as he rubbed them with his hands. She shouldn’t have said it, she knew she had no right to say something like that, and the look of unmistakable pain on his face only made her feel that much worse.

But that didn’t change how much she wanted him. God, she wanted him so badly.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said that,” she muttered.

“No, you shouldn’t have,” he said. He was probably trying to chide her, probably wanting so badly to be mad at her, but he didn’t fool her. She heard it, even if he didn’t hear it himself. He didn’t sound irritated or annoyed. He just sounded so incredibly exhausted.

She picked at her nails, “I shouldn’t have said it,” she admitted. “…but I meant what I said.”

He pulled his hand away from his face and regarded her with a heavy gaze, “you did, didn’t you?”

She fiddled with the sleeves of her hoodie, still holding his eyes with her own and whispered out a barely audible, “yes.”

Tobirama’s eyes flickered across her face, probably searching for some indication that she wasn’t being serious, that she was just being a sarcastic pain in the ass, that she didn’t actually want him to stay, but he couldn’t find whatever he was looking for. So he let out a defeated sigh and shook his head.

“…Fine.”

Then he walked into the bathroom and shut the door a little too hard behind him.

Naminé winced at the sound and bit down on her bottom lip as she picked at her nails.

He wasn’t really going to stay, was he? As much as she wanted him to, as much as she wanted to be closer to him, she doubted that he would. Madara was right. Tobirama probably was still pissed at her for leaving, and he had every right to feel that way. Like she said, she was pissed at herself for leaving too, but that didn’t change the way she felt. She wanted him to stay with her, that much was clear… But if he didn’t, she would have quietly accepted that.

But then Tobirama came out of the bathroom in a pair of sweatpants that hung low on his hips, without a shirt on. He headed over to the side of the bed that was closer to the door and Naminé’s heart quickened.

He was actually going to stay…

The bed dipped as he sat down and just like that, he turned the light off and lied down on his stomach, arms folded over his head.

Naminé just sat there for a minute, temporarily frozen since she was totally blown away.

Then she carefully lied down and rolled over onto her side, trying to breathe deeply so her heart would just slow down.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This went up today because this and chapter 9 were actually supposed to be one chapter but it would have been way too long. So I wanted to put them up back to back. 
> 
> ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> _[A form 8-K is a broad form used to notify investors of public companies of specified events that may be important to shareholders]_

A groan escaped Naminé’s lips when the sound of her alarm went off. She blindly tapped away at her phone until the alarm was silenced, and sighed deeply when she lied back down and let her eyes flutter shut.

She swore she only closed her eyes for a few seconds, but five minutes must have gone by because her alarm was going off again. Naminé repeated the motion of blindly tapping at the screen until she found the snooze button and rolled over in bed to try and grab another few precious moments of sleep.

She fell back into a shallow state of sleep and then goddamnit that stupid alarm was going off for a third time.

“ _Naminé_ ,” a voice beside her hissed.

Naminé’s eyes snapped open after having fumbled around with her phone and sat up, looking to the side of the bed where Tobirama was on his stomach, his arms folded over his head.

Yeah… She had forgotten about that…

In those first few moments of sleep inertia she completely forgot about the fact that she asked Tobirama to stay last night and that he actually did for God knows what reason. It was almost hard to believe that she had forgotten, because she spent most of the night trying to stay as far away from him as humanly possible. Naminé was not a peaceful sleeper unless she was under some sort of influence like alcohol or painkillers. If she went to bed sober, then she was a hot mess all night. She was one of those people who woke up with the blanket all tangled in her legs and her arms splayed across the bed in weird positions.

But last night she tried to keep herself on the edge of the bed because she very much doubted Tobirama would appreciate her restless sleeping habits.

Naminé didn’t say anything to him. She just grabbed her phone and got up, trying to be quiet as she padded to the door and quietly slipped out to go take a shower in the spare bathroom.

She changed out of her clothes and got into the shower, reliving last night’s events. She’d have to get her windshield fixed as soon as possible because she hated being at the mercy of others to get from point A to point B.

As she went through the routine of getting ready for work, such as taking a long shower, trying to tame her short hair, and putting on light makeup, she tried to get a handle on her thoughts.

She couldn’t stop thinking about Tobirama for five goddamn seconds and she was really getting sick of it.

Naminé had probably spent at least a third of her life thinking about the younger Senju brother, okay? She had no problem admitting that. But when you had a crush on the same guy from the time of childhood to the time of adulthood, that was just bound to happen. And after she left, she spent every waking moment and every sober and intoxicated thought on him for at least the first year. And then after enough time had passed, she managed to banish him from her thoughts and lock those memories far, far away.

Even when she initially moved back home she hadn’t thought about him. Even when she was just temporarily helping out at Hidden Leaf Hospital she didn’t think about anyone named Senju. She kept her head down and worked. And then the day her position became finalized and she came across Hashirama and Mito that all went down the goddamn drain.

But ever since she started staying with him he was steadily on her mind more, and okay, that was to be expected. But after last night? Well shit. She was screwed and she damn well knew it.

She had been too bold. She shouldn’t have massaged his shoulders and she shouldn’t have pushed him to stay, regardless of how she felt about him.

God, what the hell was she thinking?

Naminé shook the embarrassment from her head and grabbed her pill canister and popped two pills, drinking water directly from the faucet, and put her workbag together.

She went downstairs and absentmindedly put her hand to her back when she could feel a sharp stinging sensation.

That was odd. The Percocet should have numbed that…

She winced and walked into the kitchen when she smelled coffee and saw Tobirama leaning against the counter, sipping from a mug, and reading over some papers he held.

He was already dressed for work despite it not even being seven. Her eyes lingered on him as she quietly went to get coffee for herself.

He looked nice in his work clothes, consisting of black slacks, a white button down, and a deep blue tie, though his suit jacket was draped over one of the chairs at the table. She couldn’t help but think how well the shirt fit him, as it brought her attention to those broad shoulders and strong arms, and she had to look away before her thoughts got away from her.

To avoid any awkward silence that she knew was bound to happen since she asked him to _sleep in the bed with her_ last night, she decided to be a giant pain in the ass as per usual to diffuse any tension.

“You do know they make ties that aren’t the color blue, right?” She teased, knowing full well that most of his ties were blue.

Tobirama didn’t even look at her when he said under his breath, “insufferable woman.” However, despite his words, there was no bite there.

She smiled softly to herself and sipped on her coffee, checking the time on her watch. She’d actually be on time for a change. Mark that on the calendar.

“Red would look nice on you,” she suggested, keeping her eyes on him, deciding to make an effort to hold off on her sarcasm. He didn’t seem uncomfortable after last night, so maybe there was no tension to worry about after all.

“Mm,” he hummed, still not looking at her.

“Although, that knot is a little too big,” she said, nodding at his tie.

He rolled his eyes and looked up from his papers with a glare on his face, “my tie is fine.”

“I’m sure it is. I’m just making an observation,” she said with a soft laugh.

His eye twitched, “and you think you can do better?”

“I might be able to,” she said. She set her coffee down and walked right up to him, tugging his tie between her fingers. “I’m a surgeon. I tie knots all day long.”

He kept that heavy glare on her, “I know.”

Of course he knew. They lived together when she was in med school, when she used to have little sets of strings lying all over their apartment to practice her knots whenever she got the chance. She used to keep one on the handle of the refrigerator, since anytime she walked by it she would have an excuse to practice. It used to drive him up a wall because there would be little strings _everywhere_. So he obviously knew that she could tie a knot.

“I used to tie my father’s ties too,” she said, remembering being a little girl and standing on her parents bed in the morning and tying her father’s tie, all giddy with excitement at the prospect of being able to help. “I’m an expert.”

Tobirama sighed, already fed up with her shit, “well then?”

Her eyes flickered up to his and she knew that she was standing too close to him, and that if she had any idea what was good for her, then she would have taken a step back. But she didn’t. She smirked and kept eye contact with him as she slowly popped his collar up and began to undo his tie.

She loosened it first, pulling it side to side a little too slowly, and then went ahead with pulling the wide end out of the knot, and carefully undoing the rest of the knot. She kept her eyes locked with his as she did, and continued to smirk when she saw him suck in a breath. When she had successfully taken it apart, she smoothed out both ends of the tie on either side of his chest, her fingers grazing down his torso as she did, feeling the heat of his skin through the thin material of his dress shirt.

There was something about undoing his tie that made the air between them change, because it suddenly felt heavier, and her body felt warm all over. She felt the need to bite down painfully on her bottom lip as a way to keep herself anchored down.

She didn’t miss the way his eyes fluttered so they were half lidded, noticing the way they slowly dragged away from her eyes and down to her lips, going further down her neck, coming back up only to pause at where her teeth were currently raking across her lower lip.

She broke the heated gaze and looked at his undone tie, taking the ends in either hand and going ahead to tie a standard Windsor knot. She could tie a Windsor knot fairly quickly, but felt the need to take her time, not wanting whatever had passed over them to disappear so quickly.

Naminé finished by pulling the wide end through the loop, and tightening it so it rested right below the base of his throat. Then she stepped a little closer to carefully reach her hands up to his collar to fold it back down. She could feel every breath he took at this proximity, and pushed things a little further by being too bold and running her hands maddeningly slow down the entirety his chest, under the guise of smoothing out his tie, feeling every chord of muscle just beneath his shirt. She could feel him shiver underneath her touch along with the way her own body thrummed with electricity. She eventually pulled her hands back and dared a look at him, wanting to take an ice bath after seeing the way his dark gaze drank her in.

“See?” She said, her voice as light and soft as a feather. “Perfect.”

Tobirama blinked and straightened up from where he leaned against the counter, and just like that, the heaviness between them was gone and she was taking a step back to put some much needed space between them.

“I’m sure it looks exactly the same,” he muttered quietly.

Naminé didn’t say anything. She _couldn’t_ say anything. Not unless she wanted to be stumbling over her words like some bumbling idiot schoolgirl with a crush.

“Let’s go. Otherwise you’ll be late,” he grunted, grabbing his suit jacket and stepping out of the kitchen.

Naminé sucked in a breath, feeling like she had just been submerged underwater for too long and rubbed the back of her neck.

That was too bold and she knew it.

She chugged down a few more gulps of her coffee and left the mug in the sink, opting to get another cup at work. She walked to the front door of the house, throwing her jacket on and following Tobirama outside to his car.

On the way out she paused to look at her own car, visually assessing it for any other damage, and was grateful when she saw that the only thing wrong with it was the shattered windshield. At least that was a relatively easy fix. She’d have to find a way to get it to a shop one day this week.

Maybe she could pay to have it towed? Even if that was a bit excessive. But then again, maybe it wasn’t, since with the way it was shattered there was no way she’d be able to drive it anywhere.

There was a heavy silence between them in the car, and Naminé really didn’t know what to do with herself because of it. She fiddled with the sleeves of her jacket, picked at her nails, continued to run her fingers through her hair, and tapped her foot on the floor.

She really hated the silence because it made her think about how she was beginning to cross a sort of line. They had gone from fighting every time they were in a room together, to participating in comfortable banter, and something else? She didn’t know. Maybe she was just overthinking it because she had finally come to terms with the fact that she missed him and that she wanted him in her life again.

Maybe things were fine and it really was all in her head.

She squeezed her eyes shut and rested her head against the window of the car as she continued to work herself up.

Christ, if the silence lasted any longer her heart was going to burst from her chest.

“So—”

“What time are you done work?” Tobirama cut her off before her rambling could start, and thank God for that, because she had no idea what she would have said, but she was willing to bet that it would have been exceedingly stupid.

She exhaled in relief, “technically I clock out at seven, but I’m not done charting until at least seven-thirty.”

In her peripheral vision she could see him nod as he continued to watch the road.

“I can ask someone to drive me back,” she said under her breath.

“No,” Tobirama said right away. “I’ll pick you up.”

Even though she still felt awkward and stupid from everything that transpired between them in the last eight or nine hours, she really did feel safer if he was the one picking her up.

“Okay. Just call me or something whenever you park and I’ll walk out.”

“I’ll come in and get you,” his tone left no room for argument and it made Naminé narrow her eyes in suspicion. It was normal for Tobirama to get intensely protective when it came to certain people he considered family, but this might have been pushing it.

“Why?” She asked.

“Because I said so,” he said in that same low voice he used a second ago.

She narrowed her eyes, “it’s because you saw something outside last night, isn’t it?”

He didn’t say anything back, he just focused on driving. Naminé turned her head to try and get him to look at her, at least for just a second, but Tobirama was stoic as ever, blatantly ignoring her.

But that was answer enough for her. He clearly saw something even though she doubted he was going to tell her what it was.

She heaved a great sigh and rubbed the back of her neck, “…All right then. You know that café I had you go to when you dropped off my scrub cap? You can just meet me there a little after seven-thirty.”

“Mm,” he hummed.

Naminé wasn’t too proud to admit that she hated the silence that settled back over them. Tobirama was quiet most of the time. That was normal. What wasn’t normal was her inability to get him to loosen up.

She definitely had crossed a line with her poor decision making skills.

The rest of the car ride was silent and Naminé had never been so happy to get to the hospital before, so unbelievably grateful to be away from that deafening silence between them.

“Thanks,” she said as she got out of the car.

She checked the time on her watch and saw that she had twenty minutes before she had to technically start her rounds. If Chief Sarutobi could see her actually early for once he might have dropped dead of a heart attack.

Naminé entered the locker room, narrowing her eyes when she saw Kurenai talking to Asami a few lockers down from her own. She strained her ears to try and hear what they were saying as she opened her locker and started to change into her scrubs.

Naminé peeled her shirt off and went to put her scrub top on, but accidentally dropped it. She huffed and leaned down to grab it, but paused when the sounds of Kurenai and Asami’s conversation came to an abrupt halt.

She frowned and looked at the two of them to see them both staring her down.

“What?” Naminé asked.

“Christ, Doc. What the hell happened to you?” Kurenai breathed out, her eyes wide and focused on Naminé’s bare torso.

It was then that Naminé realized they were staring at the scars on her body, so she hastily pulled her scrub top on.

“Nothing,” Naminé mumbled, changing into her pants as fast as humanly possible, not wanting them to see the scars that disfigured the tops of her thighs.

After Naminé had changed, she looked at Asami and Kurenai. Kurenai still seemed a little taken aback, but Asami was looking at Naminé with her eyebrows knit together in what Naminé could only describe as suspicion.

She looked away from them and shrugged on her white coat, slipping her scrub cap into one of the pockets and putting her stethoscope around her neck.

“Those were some pretty deep scars, Naminé,” Asami said.

Naminé grinded her teeth together. She couldn’t snap at Asami. Not after they had agreed on a truce, no matter how much she wanted to.

“Mhm,” Naminé muttered, throwing her workbag in her locker and slamming it shut.

“They almost look like the same injuries on our patient yesterday,” Asami said.

Naminé gave her a tight smile, walking right passed the two of them, “small world.”

* * *

“That was…” Hashirama paused.

“Underwhelming,” Tobirama finished for his brother with his arms crossed, glaring at the chair across from them. They had spent the entire morning interviewing candidates for the chief legal counsel position, and to say that their results were dismal would be an understatement.

Hashirama sighed and crossed his arms. He didn’t even try to argue with Tobirama or try to be upbeat. The prospects had been that bad.

“We’ll find someone,” Hashirama said, though his voice betrayed how discouraged he actually was. Hashirama was never good at hiding his emotions.

“Mm,” Tobirama grunted.

“We will,” Hashirama pressed.

Tobirama wanted to be optimistic, he did, but it was getting hard. He was taking over most of the duties of the position himself, and while he didn’t mind doing things like staying late at the office or coming in early, it was getting old.

The door of the conference room opened to show their CEO Minato Namikaze walking in, wearing a sheepish grin on his face.

“How are the interviews going?”

“Terribly,” Tobirama deadpanned.

Minato blinked a few times and looked at Hashirama for further confirmation, but his brother only nodded in agreement.

“That bad?” Minato asked.

“It’s all right. We’ll find someone,” Hashirama said. “Are you going to sit in on the next round with Jiraiya?”

“I am,” Minato said. The blonde man then directed his attention at Tobirama and worked his jaw.

“What?” Tobirama asked, keeping his arms crossed.

“I hate to ask this, but Financial Reporting is getting some 8-K’s together and Legal needs help. They’re totally swamped with The Akatsuki Group and Danzo stuff, and without someone filling the position it’s turning into chaos. Shikaku went over and asked one of the teams to review the 8-K’s he just put together and got chewed out for a solid five minutes. Any chance you could…” Minato trailed off, and that’s when Tobirama’s eyes flickered to the thick stack of papers the CEO held.

He held in a sigh, “that’s fine.”

Hashirama eyed the stack of papers up when Minato set them on the table and looked at the blonde man in confusion, “how many are there?”

“Seven,” Minato answered. “Shikaku looked over them himself but they need to be reviewed by one of the company’s attorneys and preferably signed off on by the chief legal counsel. Unfortunately, that’s pretty much Tobirama right now.”

Hashirama grabbed one of the draft 8-K’s and flipped through it, “why the hell are they so long?”

“Three of them address The Akatsuki Group stuff, two of them address Danzo, and the other two address the new internal changes,” Minato answered easily, scratching the back of his head.

“When do you need them?” Tobirama asked, already eyeing up the stack.

“End of day tomorrow,” Minato said with a frown. “Shikaku can’t push it back any further. We’re already over two weeks late with the publishing and got fined for it. Tobirama, I’m sorry.”

Tobirama was silent, just staring at the documents as if they had personally offended him. Part of him wanted to rip into Minato for waiting so long to get them to him, but he knew it wasn’t his fault. So he just kept his mouth shut and nodded.

Hashirama sighed, “the sooner we fill Danzo’s position the better.”

“Couldn’t agree more,” Minato said. “I’ve got to meet with Shikaku and Jiraiya, so if you need me I’ll be in my office.”

“All right. Thank you, Minato,” Hashirama said.

Minato nodded and walked out, leaving Tobirama to continue to stare at the stack of 8-K’s in front of him.

“Are you okay with this?” Hashirama asked, getting up and stretching his legs.

Tobirama didn’t really have a choice in the matter and Hashirama knew that.

“Mm,” he started. “It’s fine, I can just stay late—” Tobirama stopped himself as soon as the words left his mouth.

He couldn’t stay late. He had to pick up Naminé from the hospital at seven-thirty.

“What? What is it?” Hashirama was giving him that overly concerned brotherly look of his as he planted his hands on his hips, waiting for a response.

Tobirama groaned and rubbed his eyes in annoyance, “I can’t stay late.”

Hashirama raised an eyebrow, “I know I said last week that you couldn’t go home late because of Naminé, but I’m sure she’ll understand in this case.”

That made him groan a second time, even more annoyed than before, “that’s not it.”

“Then what is?”

He stood up and crossed his arms, “someone smashed her windshield last night and I had to drive her to work. I’ve got to pick her up after her shift.”

Hashirama’s dark eyes grew to the size of saucers and he went very still, “and this happened when? After she left my house to go to the hospital?”

Tobirama frowned, “no.”

“So this happened at your house?”

He nodded and clenched his jaw tight, “yes, and they wanted her to know they did it because they rang the doorbell after, but no one was there.” He thought of how he made her go back inside when it happened and how he walked around the perimeter of his house afterwards. No one had been there, but the screen for his kitchen window had been removed, and that made him uneasy to say the very least, because he _knew_ he saw someone walk by that window last night.

He chose to leave that detail out when he went back inside and saw the look of absolute horror on Naminé’s face. That missing screen was the whole reason he made her sleep upstairs.

Tobirama wasn’t worried for his own safety. He could hold his own just fine, and God help the person that decided to attack him in his own home because he could be ruthless when he wanted. But Naminé was another story. She was already on edge enough as it was, and he just felt better if she was upstairs and away from that window.

And it was also the reason why he insisted on going into the hospital to walk her out to the car. If her stalker was crazy enough to follow her to his house, and mess with his things, then who was to say he wouldn’t show up in a dark hospital parking lot and get to her on her way out?

Hashirama rubbed his hand across his chin, taking in his brother’s words and nodding very slowly.

“Yeah… You can’t stay late,” Hashirama mumbled.

“I’ll get everything done in time,” Tobirama said, and it meant it. He would. He would just have a late night is all.

“I’m not worried about that,” Hashirama said. “I’m worried about Naminé.”

Tobirama was too, especially after last night, but his brother didn’t need to know that.

“She’s fine,” he said.

“She seemed fine at dinner,” Hashirama said with a shrug. Then he cleared his throat and his voice lightened up when he said, “you both seemed fine.”

Tobirama narrowed his eyes, “what does that mean?”

“Oh nothing,” Hashirama smirked and Tobirama suddenly wanted to wipe that look off of his face. “Just that you two seemed to be getting along well.”

Tobirama scoffed, pushing away the memory of Naminé tying his tie just a few hours earlier and the way she had touched him as she did, “Hashirama, don’t.”

“I’m not!” Hashirama said, holding his hands up in defense. “I’m just making an observation. A _happy_ observation, but an observation regardless.”

“ _Tch_.”

“I’m just glad you’re getting along is all,” Hashirama said easily.

Tobirama sucked in a breath. They _were_ getting along. They were getting along really well, at least by their standards they were. And that was the problem.

He didn’t necessarily want to get along with Naminé. He didn’t necessarily want her giving him soft smiles and having easy conversations with him. He didn’t necessarily want her giving him lingering touches. He had been prepared to deal with her sarcasm and occasional harsh comments, and he had been prepared to deal with the constant aggravation and constant fighting that came from having her around.

He had prepared himself for all of that when he offered her a place to stay. What he hadn’t prepared himself for was how easy it was going to be to fall back into a familiar state of contentment with her.

Sure, there was history between them, a lifetime even, but not enough to make him want to go back to that place.

At least he didn’t think so?

It was like he couldn’t help himself though. He wanted to protect her, and last night he chalked that up to the fact that she was like family to him and he wanted to protect all of his family members—obnoxious insufferable doctors included. But he wanted to leave it at that and that alone.

But then she was looking at him with soft eyes and asking him to stay the way she might have done years ago and his resolve crumbled. He should have said no to her, but he didn’t.

He didn’t say no because that’s when he realized that he missed her, despite going out of his way to push those thoughts away.

That was the part he hated most. Having gone soft in a moment of weakness.

It actually just pissed him off the more of he thought about it.

“Stop fuming like that,” Hashirama said with a snicker. “Come on. Let’s get lunch.”

But Tobirama shook his head, “I’m going to get started on the 8-Ks.”

Hashirama looked like he wanted to argue, but then he was looking at the stack of papers brought in by Minato and seemed to think twice.

“All right. I’ll see you in a little bit.”

Tobirama exhaled deeply when his brother left the room and he picked up the stack of papers and sat back down, rubbing the back of his neck.

That was when he realized his neck wasn’t as stiff as it usually was, and that even though his shoulders were sore, the pain wasn’t as intense as it had been only a day ago thanks to Naminé.

He groaned and put his hands to his forehead, getting pissed off all over again.

* * *

Naminé shifted uncomfortably in her desk chair when her back singed with white hot pain, forcing her to grit her teeth and squeeze her eyes shut when the pulsing pain didn’t stop. She put her hand on her back and hissed through her teeth, and when the pain got to be too much, she reached into her desk and gripped the pill canister in there to take something to help the pain, but when she opened it her stomach dropped when she realized it was empty.

“ _Shit_ ,” she cursed. Her only other pills were all the way downstairs in her workbag that was in her locker.

She couldn’t deal with the pain or the itch in her fingers when the pain came and went, and got up from her desk to go downstairs to take something.

“Chief,” Naminé said with a gasp when she opened the door of her office to see Chief Sarutobi.

He wore a deep frown that brought attention to all of the lines on his weathered face, “Dr. Nakano. I’m glad I caught you.”

Naminé paused, stepping aside to let him in her office and cleared her throat, “is there a problem?”

Chief Sarutobi took a seat in the chair in front of her desk and Naminé held back a sigh and went to sit back down. So much for going downstairs to get something for her back.

“I’m sure you can imagine my surprise when I come into work today and find that my entire staff is gossiping about how my Head of General and Trauma Surgery called Dr. Matsuo a stupid bitch.”

So that’s what this was about…

Naminé winced, “in my defense—”

“I heard all about it. You snapped at her because she didn’t follow your directions so the patient bled to death. I understand the frustration, Naminé. I really do. Traumas are your call and she should have listened to you, but blowing up on her in front of everyone because you two have been at each other’s throats since you were girls is not okay!” He snapped, smacking his hand on her desk for extra effect.

She ran her fingers through her hair, pushing it back and out of her face.

“I did apologize,” Naminé murmured.

“Good,” Sasuke said, his voice still firm and reprimanding. “You two are going to have to learn to get along.”

She nodded, “I know, I know.”

He glared but let out a sigh, “I don’t like having to reprimand you.”

“Well good because I don’t like it either.”

He gave her a fatherly look and scratched the back of his head, “I just want what’s best for this hospital and having you two fight like this is not what’s best.”

Naminé withheld the urge to roll her eyes, “you don’t say.”

He glowered, “watch your tongue.”

Naminé held her hands up in defense, “you’re right. I’m sorry.” She planned on ushering the chief out and then going downstairs to get something for her back, but then Naminé decided against that. If Chief Sarutobi was already here, then she might as well just ask him.

“Chief, since you’re here I was wondering if I could talk to you about my back.”

Sasuke wasted no time in narrowing his eyes, “the Percocet isn’t helping?”

She swallowed hard, “it is. I’m just… Well I’m running low and—”

Sasuke narrowed his eyes even more and his brow furrowed, “I don’t mind giving you a refill, but with what you’re taking I’d rather you get your back checked out first.”

She expected that much, “okay.”

“Go see someone from ortho first. I don’t want you being on opioids unless you absolutely have to be.”

Her fingertips itched but she couldn’t push the issue anymore without sounding desperate—which she wasn’t.

“Okay.” She then thought of Kagami and leaned forward, holding Chief Sarutobi’s attention. “On an unrelated note, what do you think of Dr. Kagami Uchiha?”

Sasuke looked thoughtful for a moment, “I think he’s a fantastic surgeon. Why do you ask?”

Naminé gave Sasuke a small smile, “well he told me that he wanted to go for a trauma fellowship, and I think that if he applies here you should consider taking him on.”

Sasuke nodded, though his face became more serious, “it’s not that I don’t think he’d make a good fellow, because I think he’d be an asset anywhere. But I find that it’s usually better to go to another hospital when it comes to fellowships so you can branch out.”

Naminé nodded, “I agree—”

“But?” Sasuke said with a smirk, knowing that she wasn’t just going to leave it at that.

“ _But_ I really think we should keep him on, Chief. He’s great. The last time I saw someone that good well… Well they were me,” she said it with a laugh, not being serious enough to actually mean it, but being serious enough for Sasuke to know that she really felt Kagami deserved the position.

“How you manage to be so arrogant while staying so humble is a mystery to me.” Sasuke still smiled at her though. “I’m not going to promise you anything, but I will take another look at his application since you think so highly of him.”

She grinned.

“Perfect.”

* * *

“So you called Dr. Matsuo a stupid bitch.”

Naminé collapsed into the chair across from Kurenai during a lunch break, unwrapping the sandwich she got from the hospital’s crappy cafeteria.

“You heard about that, huh?”

“Everyone heard about it,” Kurenai said.

“I shouldn’t have said that,” she admitted. She knew she was out of line when she went off like that, but Asami had been out of line too. And both of those things mixed with the fact that that woman they operated on had the very same injuries that Naminé once had set her teeth on edge. She shouldn’t have said it, but the reality was that she did and it was too late to take it all back.

“No, but you did,” Kurenai took a bite out of her salad that she brought in from home and then continued. “And the whole hospital is talking about it.”

“Yeah, I’m aware. Chief Sarutobi already gave me shit for it,” Naminé admitted.

“Eh. People will get over it,” Kurenai started, and suddenly she was looking at Naminé with a mischievous glint in her eyes that made Naminé almost want to walk away because nothing good could come from the way she was looking at her. “So… How’s Mr. Tall Pale and Scary?”

Yep. She definitely wanted to walk away.

“No,” Naminé warned, tearing off a corner of her sandwich.

“Oh no. You’re on my case about Asuma all the time, that means I get to be on your case about your ex.”

“Kurenai,” Naminé said with a glare.

“I don’t know what I was expecting, but he definitely wasn’t it. He just seemed way too uptight for you. But then again, you’re such a hot mess that maybe you need someone like that,” Kurenai could not have looked anymore smug if she tried, casually looking at her nails and picking away at her salad.

“I am not a hot mess,” Naminé argued.

“So I’m guessing he’s the one that you were supposed to marry,” Kurenai leaned forward. “So why’d you leave? You wouldn’t shut the hell up about him when I was driving you there, so obviously you still feel some type of way about him.”

Naminé’s stomach twisted, causing her to plunge her hands into the pockets of her white coat and clutch onto her scrub cap for reassurance.

“First of all, I am too sober to tell you that story. Second of all, I do not feel any particular way about him,” she tried to sound stern, she really did. But she could also feel her cheeks flushing as the words left her mouth.

Kurenai actually snorted as she laughed, “you are so full of shit. Maybe you were too drunk to remember, but you spent that entire car ride going on and on about him.”

Naminé scratched the back of her head. She must have been too drunk to remember, because she didn’t think she had said anything excessive, but clearly she was wrong.

“Do I want to know what I said?” Naminé asked with a slight wince, terrified of the answer.

“I think you told me how broad his shoulders were at least a dozen times,” Kurenai said, her smirk widening.

If Naminé wasn’t blushing before, then she was now, “I didn’t need to know that.” She ate the piece of her sandwich that she tore off and Kurenai laughed and continued eating her own lunch.

“Hey, any chance you could pick me up on your way in tomorrow? I’m having car trouble,” Naminé said, eager to change the subject.

“Uh sure,” Kurenai’s eyes flickered to hers. “Where’s your place?”

Naminé cleared her throat, “…I’m still staying with my ex.”

Kurenai actually laughed, “of course you are.”

“Oh shut up.”

“You can’t blame me for being curious. I hear you’re a runaway bride, you don’t deny it, you’re staying with the guy you ran away from—”

“I did _not_ run away from him, okay?” Naminé snapped.

Kurenai paused, the smirk gone from her face along with that mischievous glint in her eyes, “I was just messing around, Doc. You don’t need to get so upset.”

Naminé rubbed her forehead. She shouldn’t have gone off on Kurenai like that. She didn’t know the full story. Pretty much no one did. And Naminé knew that from an outsider’s perspective that that’s what it might have looked like.

But Tobirama hadn’t been what she was running away from, okay? The things that were going on that made her leave weren’t even related to the Senju family. They were all solely centered around her own shit show of a life those last few years.

“Sorry,” Naminé said, letting her eyes fall to the table.

“It’s all right,” Kurenai muttered. “I’ll pick you up around six-thirty.”

“Thanks,” Naminé said under her breath.

Thankfully the awkwardness that settled between them was interrupted by Asuma walking over to them, casually grabbing a chair and pulling it up to their table.

“Hey,” Kurenai said, eyeing him up a little suspiciously.

“Hey yourself,” Asuma greeted with a smirk coming onto his face.

Naminé raised an eyebrow, “should I give you two some privacy?”

Asuma’s eyes flickered to Naminé with a chuckle, “not at all. I wouldn’t want to upset you and be called a stupid bitch behind my back.”

Her mouth fell open, “seriously?”

Asuma smirked even harder, “seriously.”

She scoffed, “is he supposed to fill in for Dr. Uchiha as our favorite resident when he’s not here? Because if he is, he’s doing a terrible job.”

Kurenai laughed as soon as the words left Naminé’s mouth, “he _is_ a poor excuse for Kagami.”

Asuma snickered and look at Naminé, raising one eyebrow above the other, “you and Dr. Uchiha, huh? I didn’t know you liked younger men, Nakano.”

Naminé gaped and didn’t even think twice when she leaned forward to slap Asuma on the arm.

Kurenai tried her best to hold in a laugh, but she wasn’t very successful because every time she went to take a sip of her water she had put it down because she was shaking from her her smothered giggles, “Kagami is too nice. Nakano likes her men intimidating.”

Naminé scowled at them, “I hate you both. From now on I’m eating lunch in my office.”

“Oh yeah? Define intimidating because I might actually know someone you’d be interested in,” Asuma said. He actually wasn’t teasing her. He actually sounded serious.

“No,” Naminé deadpanned.

“Forget it, Asuma. She’s hung up on her ex,” Kurenai said easily.

If Kurenai said that a week or so ago, Naminé would have vehemently denied it. But right now? Kurenai might have been right… She just wouldn’t admit it out loud.

“I’m changing the subject now,” Naminé cut in before the two of them could give her more of a hard time. “Dr. Sarutobi, you’re an ortho guy.”

Asuma nodded, taking a bite out of an apple, “I am.”

“Any chance you could do me a favor and take a look at my back? I’ve got some pretty bad pain and Chief wants me to get it checked out,” she said, careful not to sound too eager.

Asuma nodded a second time, “sure. What’s wrong with it?”

“I was in a bad car accident years ago and the pain comes and goes. Lately it’s been pretty bad.”

“You taking anything for it?”

She pursed her lips. She couldn’t really lie and tell him it was a muscle relaxer like she had done to Toka.

“Oxycodone and acetaminophen,” she said.

“So you’re on Percocet,” he said nonchalantly as he took another bite out of his apple.

For whatever reason, hearing someone else say it set Naminé’s teeth on edge.

“Yeah,” she answered.

“Pain must be pretty bad then. No wonder Chief wants you to see someone,” Kurenai said, her eyes focused on where Naminé sat across from her.

“It’s fine,” she tried as she averted her eyes from Kurenai.

But Asuma wasn’t having it. He just shrugged and shook his head, “well it obviously isn’t fine if you’re on Percocet of all things. Your pain has to be pretty severe.”

She clenched her jaw, “yeah I guess.”

“When was the last time you had a CT?” Asuma asked.

“Um. Maybe…” How long had it been? She couldn’t remember. “Maybe five or six years?”

“Well I’m busy today, but tomorrow I should have time. We can get you a CT and go from there if you want,” he said.

She tore off another piece of her sandwich as a way to relax her aching fingertips, “okay. Sounds good. Thank you.”

Asuma smirked at her, “still think I’m a bad substitute for Kagami?”

Naminé and Kurenai looked at each other, each trying to stifle a laugh.

“Yes, as a matter of fact I do.”

* * *

Tobirama waited for Naminé in the hospital’s little café, looking over emails on his phone. He had only managed to get through two of the seven 8-K’s with what little free time he had at work, and was dreading how late his night was going to be with another five to go over. Frankly, he would have been shocked if he got any sleep at all tonight.

Glancing over an email from Jiraiya talking about one of the 8-K’s, Tobirama felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked away from his phone, expecting to see Naminé and instead was greeted with Asami.

“Tobirama,” she said, her delicate face breaking into a pretty smile. “I feel like I haven’t seen you in ages.”

His jaw clenched, “how are you, Asami?” He was painfully aware of her hand sliding down his shoulder and coming to rest on his bicep.

“I’m good,” she kept that pretty smile on her face as her ice blue eyes tried to read his expression. “How have you been? Hashirama told me you’ve been working nonstop. You must be stressed.”

He clenched his jaw even tighter than he thought possible when her hand trailed further down his arm.

“I’ve just been busy,” he said in a clipped voice.

“You’re always busy. I’m sure that’s why you haven’t been returning my calls,” she laughed softly and withdrew her hand from his arm but stepped closer to him. “What are you doing here? Did something happen to Hashirama or Mito?”

He didn’t want to do this right now. He had enough going on without Asami complicating things.

“No, they’re both fine,” he said, hoping to avoid the inevitable subject that was Naminé.

Asami and Naminé did not like each other, had never liked each other, and Tobirama very much doubted that they would ever like each other. Bringing up the fact that he was picking up Naminé was a guaranteed way to make Asami go from zero to one hundred in less than a second.

She narrowed her eyes, “so then why are you here?”

His eyes swept over her frame. She was clearly getting off from her shift, as her hair was no longer in clean curls and there was a black smudge beneath her left eye from her makeup, but she still somehow managed to look both put together and professional.

“Asami,” he started, trying to approach the subject as carefully as possible.

“Yes?” She kept her icy blues eyes on him and he sighed and crossed his arms. Might as well just come out with it then. So much for avoiding complications.

“I’m here to pick up Naminé.”

And there it was, the reaction that he knew was coming and didn’t have the patience to deal with.

Asami blinked a few times and took a step back, putting some much needed distance between the both of them, “Naminé?”

“Yes.”

“Why?” Her voice was much harsher than it had been a second ago, and Tobirama fought the urge to roll his eyes. It just would have upset her more and he didn’t have it in him to deal with her tonight. Not when he had so much work he had to do.

“She’s having car trouble,” he said plainly.

Asami very clearly did not believe him because she crossed her arms and leaned on one hip, those blue eyes of hers now directing a freezing cold glare onto him.

“Right… So you haven’t been returning my calls not because of work, but because Naminé is back in town. I should have guessed.”

He couldn’t help it when he glared right back at her.

“That has nothing to do with it,” he told her quietly, hoping that she would follow his example and lower her voice.

“Okay, so why then?”

He clenched his jaw again and came back with a very low, very stern, “you know why.”

She scoffed hard enough to earn looks from the few people in the café, “no, what I know is that Naminé is back in town and you two are prob—”

“Stop,” he warned.

He could just see the thoughts buzzing through Asami’s head, probably working through accusations, trying to find the right insult for him. In any other situation, he wouldn’t have been even remotely bothered by it. But there were people around and this was where she worked and he knew just how quickly Asami could make things turn ugly. She may not have been as hotheaded as Naminé, but she was damn close.

Before she could say anything though, Tobirama could see a figure approaching them from the corner of his eye.

He looked over his shoulder to see Naminé with her hair pulled back in a tiny ponytail with one lock of hair that had fallen out and framed her face. She was looking down at her phone, eyebrows knitted together in concentration, and looked up just moments before she accidentally walked into a table.

Asami was going to love this.

“Hey, sorry I’m late. I had a trauma come—Dr. Matsuo,” Naminé paused, coming to stand beside Tobirama.

Asami’s icy eyes flashed to the blonde trauma surgeon beside him, “Naminé.”

Tobirama took immediate notice of the fact that Naminé had been very formal in her greeting, still referring to Asami as Dr. Matsuo despite the fact that they were no longer on the clock and the fact that they knew each other well enough to be on a first name basis. Whereas Asami on the other hand had not followed suit.

“So you’re having car trouble?” Asami asked, still glaring hard enough to turn someone to stone.

Naminé looked at Tobirama for a brief second in confusion before she looked back at Asami and said, “yeah?”

Asami shook her head in disbelief, “figures.”

Tobirama could see that Naminé already had enough of Asami’s shit, as she narrowed her eyes and folded her arms over her chest.

“If you have a problem, Dr. Matsuo, please. Feel free to enlighten me so I can ease your heavy burden.”

Tobirama sighed and rubbed his eyes in frustration. Leave it to Naminé to make the situation one hundred times worse by reverting back to sarcasm.

“No. No problem at all,” Asami hissed.

She forcefully shoved her way around Naminé, bumping shoulders with her and walking away without another word.

“What the hell was that?” Naminé asked. “I thought we had a truce.”

“Come on. I have a lot of work to do,” he said, not even bothering to tell her what just happened.

Thankfully, Naminé didn’t argue with him for once. She just busied herself with her phone, a little crease forming between her eyebrows as she read something. Tobirama put his hands in the pocket of his jacket as they walked toward the doors of the hospital. He thought about the work he had to do and figured that if he worked through the night, he could have gotten most of the 8-K’s reviewed with the exception of maybe one or two at the most.

They walked outside and he heard Naminé let out a low hiss when there was a strong gust of wind. He looked at her from the corner of his eye and saw her button her jacket all the way up to her neck and put her hands into her pockets with a scowl on her face.

She always hated the cold.

They were still just outside of the hospital’s entrance, not even off the sidewalk yet when someone stood up from where they were seated on a bench and stood directly in front of them.

Tobirama immediately glared at the man as they both came to a halt. He crossed his arms, feeling his temper already beginning to flare in his chest.

“Can I help you?” He snapped. He had work to do. He didn’t have time for this guy’s shit.

But the man didn’t even spare a glance at Tobirama, as his eyes immediately locked onto Naminé when he said, “Dr. Nakano, you cut all that pretty long hair off.”

Tobirama immediately looked at where Naminé was frozen beside him. She wasn’t picking at her nails or fiddling with the sleeves of her jacket. She was completely still and her pupils were blown as she looked at the man in front of them.

He knew just from the look on her face that this guy was her stalker, Hidan, and Tobirama’s upper lip curled into a snarl.

“I hope you’re ready for the trial, because I certainly am.” Hidan actually had the nerve to give her a nasty grin. “My attorney is a real jackass. Never loses a case.”

Tobirama was overwhelmed with a thousand thoughts and feelings, but there were two distinct ones that fought for dominance. The first was that he wanted to grab this guy by the neck and beat him into a goddamn coma. The second was that he wanted to get Naminé as far away from him as he possibly could.

“If you know what’s good for you you’ll leave,” Tobirama snarled. He couldn’t beat Hidan within an inch from death now, no matter how badly he wanted to. Not with the trial about to start. So he had to swallow back his anger and give in to the part of him that wanted to keep Naminé safe.

Hidan’s eyes flickered over to Tobirama, and his hands went to smooth back his hair. “Tobirama Senju,” he said, still grinning. “My attorney once tried to sue your brother.”

Tobirama kept his glare on Hidan, careful to observe any subtle movements he made. If Hidan had been trying to intimidate him by making it known that he knew his name and knew about Hashirama, then he was doing a poor job of it. Anyone with a pulse was familiar with Konoha Enterprises, and by proxy most people were familiar with Hashirama. All it took was a quick Google search to be able to find a picture of Tobirama and his brother and see that they were founders of Konoha Enterprises. And if this psycho was crazy enough to stalk Naminé to Tobirama’s house, then of course he was going to do his homework to find out more about him. So his pathetic little attempt at intimidation was a failure.

“Can we just leave?” Naminé whispered.

Tobirama bit back his anger and put his hand on her lower back, ushering her away from Hidan.

“Let’s go,” he said, careful to keep her close.

But when they tried to go forward Hidan blocked them by standing directly in front of Naminé.

Tobirama gritted his teeth and stepped in front of her, almost standing chest to chest with Hidan.

“Back. Off.” He warned.

“Dr. Nakano, did you like that present one of my fellow Jashinists left for you yesterday? Even I was impressed that she lived long enough to make it to the hospital. Tell me, did her baby die too?” Hidan asked, trying to look around Tobirama.

Tobirama thought back to last night when Naminé came back from the hospital and was clearly disheartened at the fact she lost her patient. He guessed that her patient must have been Hidan’s little “present”.

“I won’t tell you to back off again,” Tobirama hissed through his teeth, his hand now shaking with blind rage.

Hidan’s eyes returned to Tobirama and he chuckled, stepping aside and gesturing dramatically to the parking lot.

“Of course,” he said. Tobirama wrapped an arm around Naminé when he noticed just how frozen in place she was and took a few steps forward, walking by Hidan. “I just wanted to let the good doctor know that once this is all over that she will make an excellent sacrifice for Jashin.”

Out of the corner of his eye he caught Hidan stepping around him and reaching a hand out, grabbing Naminé’s tiny ponytail and pulling her head back, making her yelp.

He lost it.

All Tobirama saw was red, red, _red_ and fast enough that no one even registered what he was doing, he grabbed Hidan by the collar and forcefully shoved him against one of the pillars that held up the hospital’s entrance canopy.

“I said to _back off_ ,” he snarled, practically spitting in Hidan’s face.

“Tobirama!” Naminé called out, probably wanting to get him away from Hidan before he started beating him death.

Hidan actually laughed, even though he was wincing at the pain of being crushed against the rough pillar.

“Hit me!” He called out as he cackled. “Make sure you leave a couple of shiners right before trial. I’m sure the jury will love that.”

If Tobirama clenched his jaw any tighter he would have grinded every single one of his teeth into dust.

He couldn’t do to Hidan what he wanted to. He wanted to beat him bloody and senseless until he entered a coma. He wanted to take his head and smash it into the concrete because this sicko thought he could not only attack Naminé, but stalk her and terrify her, and vandalize her car and her house, and follow her to his house, and show up at her place of work to do who fucking knows what to her.

He wanted to put him in a goddamn body bag, but he couldn’t even so much as punch him because Hidan was right.

If he showed up to trial with visible injuries, then the jury would notice and his attorney would use that to his advantage and say Hidan was jumped by a friend of Naminé’s, even if it wasn’t true. If that happened he was sure that Toka would have been able to spin it in their favor, but he couldn’t make her job that much harder and couldn’t risk messing with the case.

“Tobirama, please!” Naminé’s voice was a quivering mess and it was the driving force that made him actually release Hidan, despite wanting to at least land one good hit on him.

Hidan smoothed his hair back again and straightened out his jacket when Tobirama let him go.

“I’ll see you in trial, Dr. Nakano. Oh, and make sure you get that windshield fixed.”

Hidan slithered away and Tobirama just stood there, seething through his teeth and unable to see straight as his blood fucking boiled.

“Tobirama?” Naminé murmured.

He couldn’t hear her over the ringing in his ears.

He couldn’t protect Kawarama and Itama all those years ago, he couldn’t stop Naminé from leaving, he couldn’t prevent his company from falling into turmoil, he couldn’t protect Naminé when she came back, and he couldn’t even fucking take any of his anger out on the sick bastard who deserved it the most.

He couldn’t do a goddamn thing.

Tobirama began to pace, feeling like he was going to explode from all of the pent up fury inside him that had nowhere to go. And without giving it any thought, he walked right up to one of pillars he just pinned Hidan up against, pulled his fist back, and punched it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It might be a week or so until the next chapter is posted (hopefully not) since I had to fly back home to Philly for a wedding! But we'll see.
> 
> Hopefully this wasn't too terrible because I thought it was awful lmao I'm so sorry if it was


	12. Chapter 12

“Tobirama, your hand!” Naminé gasped. She hurried over to where he was seething to the absolute brim with anger and frustration after having just punched one of the pillars that held up the hospital’s entrance canopy.

She didn’t even think that he felt any pain because he was still fuming and looked like he was going to punch it a second time before she stopped him by wrapping her fingers around his wrist and pulling his hand back so she could look at it.

Her eyes examined his knuckles that were split open, badly bloodied, and already bruising. She shook her head with a sigh, “Tobirama, why would you…” She stopped herself. Now was not the time to reprimand him for punching a goddamn _pillar_. He was way too furious and on edge for that. “You need sutures.”

He pulled his hand away from her and closed his eyes, trying to compose himself, “I’m fine. Let’s go.”

Her heart fell to her stomach. He was really mad. Angrier than she had seen in a really long time actually, and it was all her fault.

She was careful to keep her voice soft when she said, “no, you need sutures.”

He looked like he was going to argue with her, but Naminé placed a hand on his arm and gently pulled him back towards the hospital. He let out a heavy sigh and followed her as she led them to the trauma center, mainly because she knew the trauma center wasn’t busy since she had been in there when she clocked out, and also because she just didn’t feel like dealing with the bullshit of the ED. She just wanted to sew up his knuckles and leave.

There was so much going through her head that she actually was starting to get a headache. Between Hidan, Tobirama, the trial, the pregnant woman who died on her table only a night ago, _everything_ , she couldn’t think clearly. The only thing she had to hold onto was the fact that Tobirama had seriously hurt his hand and that it was something she could fix. With so many thoughts and images racing through her mind, she was just thankful she had something to focus on, because when all else hit the fan, she at least could hold onto to the fact that she was doctor, and that no one could take those skills from her.

When they got into the almost empty trauma center they walked right by the two surgical interns, much to Naminé’s dismay.

“Uh Dr. Nakano?”

Naminé paused to look at Kotetsu and Izumo, hoping that she didn’t look nearly as shaken up as she felt. Obviously she was more than a little frazzled from seeing Hidan, but she just hoped she could pull herself together long enough to sew up Tobirama’s knuckles without being questioned about it.

“Yes?” She asked.

“I thought you already clocked out,” Kotetsu said, averting his eyes the minute he saw Tobirama glaring him down with his arms crossed.

“That’s because I did. Neither of you just saw me,” she said, not giving them anymore information and walking over to one of the beds against the wall and pulling the curtain around them for some privacy.

She made Tobirama take a seat on the bed as she went to the sink to wash her hands and gather the supplies she needed. When she came back over she gingerly took his hand and looked it over to assess the damage he did to his knuckles.

She sighed, feeling guilty and began to clean any dirt and debris out of the wound. He didn’t wince or shift at all in discomfort like most people might have, but Naminé actually expected that of Tobirama. It just wasn’t like him to show any signs of weakness.

When she finished cleaning it, she applied a local anesthetic, and began to suture the jagged wounds closed with the ease of someone who had done it thousands of times before.

“Are you okay?” Tobirama asked as she focused on her work.

She stole a look at him, but he wasn’t looking at her. He was just looking at his hand with half lidded eyes. She looked back down and continued suturing the wound.

“I think I’m the one who should be asking you that,” she said softly. She really hoped that at least some of his anger had dissipated, or started to.

He was quiet again, not saying another word as she finished the little procedure. It only took a few sutures to sew the wounds shut, and that made her feel a little better. She cleaned around the wound again and then busied herself with disposing of the materials and rewashing her hands.

When she walked back over to where he was still sitting on the bed, she gently took his injured hand in both of hers and examined the sutures.

“Keep the area clean and in a week or so I’ll take the sutures out,” she said lightly as she looked up at him with a poor attempt of a professional smile.

Tobirama’s eyes were so incredibly steady on her that Naminé felt hot under his gaze. She couldn’t remember anyone ever looking at her like that in the last nine years.

“What did he do you to you, Naminé?” Tobirama asked. His voice was low and rough, and it made her want to jump out of her skin. She broke his gaze and looked down at his injured hand that she still held.

She gently stroked her thumb across the back of his callused hand and tried to focus on that instead. For whatever reason he didn’t pull his hand back, and her stomach fluttered.

“I don’t think you want to know. You’d get too upset,” she admitted.

Through her peripheral vision, Naminé noticed Tobirama’s head dipping down towards their interlaced hands and she sucked in a breath, suddenly feeling like she was submerged underwater.

“He changed you,” he said.

She found some courage and looked up, her eyes connecting with his, “to be fair, a lot of things did.” She tried as hard as she possibly could to keep her voice light. She didn’t want Tobirama knowing how upset she actually was. Not after she watched the way he reeled on Hidan in a fraction of a second, ready to end the bastard’s life right there.

He gave her a bitter smirk, one where the smirk only reached one corner of his mouth while he narrowed his eyes, “you’re almost timid now.”

She laughed under her breath and just barely squeezed his hand, “I don’t think anyone in this hospital would describe me as timid.”

“That’s because they don’t know you,” he muttered.

She bit down on her bottom lip, momentarily looking down at his sutured hand that she was still holding for some reason. Then she looked back at him and in a softer voice than she intended to use said, “and you know me?”

He didn’t dignify that with a response, he just kinda smirked in spite of himself, because of course he knew her. He had spent the better part of almost twenty years getting to know her. If there was anyone on the planet who knew Naminé, it was Tobirama.

She smiled in spite of herself and gently squeezed his hand again. Why he hadn’t pulled it out of her own hands yet she didn’t know, but she felt better holding it. She just felt like she wasn’t so unsteady if she was touching him.

Then again, she always felt like that.

She lifted her head to meet those intense eyes of his, a little surprised with herself for still being so close, and little surprised with him for letting her. She could feel his breath on her face and his usual angry eyes had something else in them that she couldn’t identify. There was just something in them that made her skin tingle.

“For what it’s worth, I’m really glad you were there,” she admitted.

A soft, barely audible sigh, escaped Tobirama’s lips and he squeezed her hand back, making her stomach flutter incessantly.

He wasn’t as good with his words as his brother was, but Naminé had known Tobirama long enough to understand that the gesture meant he was glad he was there too.

They stayed like that for a little while, Tobirama sitting on the bed and Naminé standing in front of him as she held his injured hand in both of her own. They should have already left. Tobirama had work to do and Naminé needed to go before someone caught her performing a procedure without checking him in or being on the clock. But she couldn’t bring herself to let go of his hand or move away.

“When does the trial start?” Tobirama asked.

“Monday,” she said. “I have to meet with Toka tomorrow night. She said she wants to prep my testimony.”

“You’re testifying then,” Tobirama said. It wasn’t even a question, just a statement.

She nodded and tucked a lock of hair behind her ear.

“Mm,” he hummed.

“What? She made it sound like I had to,” the corner of Naminé’s lips started to pull down into a frown. “Should I not do it?”

“It was just an observation,” Tobirama said.

“If you don’t think I should—”

“Naminé,” Tobirama cut her off with a ghost of a smirk on his face. “Calm down. It was just an observation.”

She let go of his hand to push her hair out of her face and chuckled under her breath to calm down, “sorry. I’m a little on edge.”

He gave her that same steady look from before, the one that seared her skin, “I know.”

She sucked in a breath to clear her head, desperate to steer the conversation away from the trial, “are you okay?”

He nodded and stood up, causing Naminé to take a step back to put some distance between them. She rubbed the back of her head and looked around the room, trying to look anywhere but at him.

“Are you?” His voice was so low that it made her shiver.

“Probably not,” she admitted with a casual shrug. “But at least I can still put a suture in, right?”

He smirked, “always comes back to work with you.”

“Don’t you think that’s the pot calling the kettle black?” She remarked.

“Perhaps,” he said, still giving her a smirk.

“I know I already said this, but…” She swallowed, hoping she wasn’t going to sound as stupid as she thought. “I really am glad that you were there.”

Tobirama nodded, and using that same low voice from before that gave her shivers said, “I’m glad I was too.”

There was something in his voice and in his words that changed the air between them, almost like that morning in the kitchen when she tied his tie. For most people, that wouldn’t have been enough to insinuate anything, but there was just so much— _too_ much history between them for something as simple as ‘I’m glad I was too’ to not be heavy with meaning.

She stood a little closer to him and looked up to try and meet his eyes, and was more than surprised to see him already completely focused on her.

She wasn’t really sure what it was that came over her. Sure, she was scared, and okay yeah, she missed him like hell, and there was also the fact that her nerves were so completely fried, but Naminé wasn’t really thinking.

She just knew that she missed him and that she was so goddamn thankful that he had been there.

So without another thought, Naminé held her breath and closed the gap between them, wrapping her arms around his torso and resting her chin on his shoulder, hugging him as tightly as she could manage, which honestly wasn’t very tight at all considering how drained she felt.

Tobirama was so stupidly tense at first, going even more rigid than she thought possible. She figured that would be his reaction, that or push her away, so she wasn’t surprised. Just a little resigned.

Naminé squeezed her eyes shut for a brief second, accepting her stupid decision, and then braced herself to pull away.

But in that moment, she could feel his arms wrap around her shoulders, pulling her against his chest and hugging her back.

Naminé wasn’t too proud to admit that the feeling of him hugging her back made her sigh and hold him a little tighter.

They stayed like that for a few more seconds, and then Tobirama put his lips to her ear and asked a soft, “what do you want from me, Naminé?”

She couldn’t help it when the corner of her lips pulled downward, and Naminé leaned back from him so she could see his face.

“What?”

He frowned back at her and rested both of his hands on the tops of her shoulders, “I know you. You have to want something, otherwise you wouldn’t…” He trailed off and gave a sad sigh and squeezed her shoulders.

She shook her head, “I don’t want anything from you.”

“Nothing?” He asked, still frowning hard enough for there to be a crease between his eyebrows.

“Of course not,” she whispered. “I just… You’re… You’re _you_ , Tobirama. I don’t want anything from you.”

He brought one of his hands down to rest on her hip and the other up to cup her cheek, effectively almost stopping her heart.

“I know you want something,” he murmured.

She bit down on the inside of her cheek. Of course she wanted something. She just wasn’t allowed to want it.

“I want you,” she admitted. It was almost like word vomit; the words just came out before she could even register them. “Not even in a romantic sense or whatever. I just… I miss you, okay? I miss you and Toka and Hashirama, and that’s not okay. But I do.”

She couldn’t believe she just said that. She had come to terms with the fact that she missed Tobirama and that she wanted him. That was fine. She had wanted Tobirama her entire life. And sure, she knew deep down she missed Toka and Hashirama and the life they all once had, but the fact that she had actually said that? Out loud? To Tobirama?

She almost felt like she should have been hopped up on Percocet or something to justify saying it.

He still cradled her face with one hand and squeezed her hip with the other. But he hadn’t pushed her away yet. So that was a good sign, right?

His eyes flickered, “after all this time you still want me.” It wasn’t a question. Just a simple observation. His hand fell away from her face and rested on the other side of her hip. “Maybe you haven’t changed as much as I thought…”

“Don’t tell me you’re surprised,” she said, just barely smiling at the incredulity of it all.

“I’m not,” Tobirama said, he was returning her weak smile with a bitter smirk of his own. “Just a little impressed that you said it.”

“Well,” she cleared her throat, all too aware that both of his hands were still firm on her hips for some reason. “I didn’t plan on saying it. It just sort of… Slipped.”

He chuckled gently and shook his head, “you are the most insufferable woman I have ever met.”

She pressed her lips together to hold off a smile, “I’m amazed you didn’t put that in your vows.”

“Maybe I did,” he said.

She swallowed hard again but managed to keep her voice light as a feather, “Hashirama would have never allowed that.”

He still gave her that bitter smirk and only hummed in agreement.

She began to pick at her nails, “I know I had no right to say that, but it’s true, so I’m not sorry that I said it. I’m just sorry if I upset you.”

He sucked in a deep breath, his fingers tightening on her hips as he did, “I don’t know how I feel right now.”

She nodded, not having anything to say to that.

Then his fingers tightened on her hips a second time, a silent reassurance that he had heard her words and that he would think them over, and then both of his hands fell away from her.

“We’ll talk about this later. Right now I have too much work I have to do.”

It was so much more than she was expecting, and yet at the same time, not at all. It was just so stupidly like Tobirama to say that they would talk about something later because he had too much work to do, and there was a part of her that wanted to laugh because it was just so goddamn endearing because it was just so painfully _him_.

So she just nodded and came back with a very soft, “okay.”

* * *

Tobirama Senju was a practical man. He was careful in his decisions, fiercely logical, and very rarely let his emotions get the best of him. He had to be like that when compared to Hashirama. Hashirama was passionate and acted on emotion. Hashirama was a massive force of nature, everyone knew that, but he wasn’t nearly as practical as Tobirama. Tobirama never resented his brother for that and he never wished he was something other than what he was.

But sometimes that pragmatic nature of his made things difficult, and the stuff with Naminé was no exception, especially because so much of it was emotionally driven. If it were Hashirama in his position, he would have given in to his emotions and told her that he wanted her too, falling victim to nostalgia and desire.

But Tobirama couldn’t do that.

But he couldn’t deny the fondness he felt for her either. He wouldn’t deny that. He had grown up knowing that she had a crush on him since childhood, he had fallen for her when he was just sixteen, and he had spent around ten years of his life in a serious relationship with her. To pretend that he didn’t feel fondness for the woman would have been absurd.

But to give into that fondness was harder and he still didn’t know if he wanted to.

There was still so much to hash out before he could even think about something like that. He needed all of the facts. He needed to be able to sit down and weigh the pros and cons of harboring the feelings that he had. Hell, it was only that morning that he admitted to himself that he still missed her.

He needed to think about it more.

He needed to approach it from a more logical side.

Tobirama was fine with her still staying with him until the stuff with her stalker was laid to rest, but he had to be careful because he was too vulnerable when it came to Naminé, and he didn’t like that.

She just… She didn’t necessarily cloud his judgment, but she appealed to a softer side of him that he didn’t like people to see. So he needed to be more aware of himself around her.

Fortunately, Tobirama didn’t have time to think about all of those things right now because he was currently in the process of reviewing the remaining five 8-K’s for Konoha Enterprises.

He welcomed the distraction, because reviewing 8-K’s was something he was comfortable and familiar with. The legal jargon was comforting for him to submerge himself in and he easily fell deep into his work, reviewing the documents in front of him.

He wasn’t sure how much, but enough time passed for him to sign off on one of the 8-K’s and start the second when there was a soft knock on the frame of the door in his upstairs office.

Naminé stood in the threshold of the door in a pair of shorts and oversized t-shirt that hung off of her small frame like a dress. She had her arms crossed over her chest and bit down on her fingernails as she looked at him.

“A friend is picking me up tomorrow morning, so you can sleep in,” she said.

Tobirama frowned, “that’s not necessary.”

“I know,” she started quickly. “I just think it’ll be easier for you.”

He sighed deeply. He wanted to press the issue, but he could tell by the look on her face that she didn’t ask someone to drive her to work to be difficult, but that she really did it to lighten his burden.

He could appreciate that.

“If you say so,” he muttered.

“I do. Um, I’m gonna sleep downstairs tonight. I don’t think Hidan will be lurking around after that little display at the hospital.”

He may have agreed to letting her friend picking her up, but agreeing to that was a step too far because all he could think about was the removed screen of his kitchen window.

“No,” he said.

She pursed her lips, working her jaw as she did, “Tobirama, I really would like it if you slept in your own bed.”

“As would I, but I would sleep better knowing you were upstairs,” he said back, careful to leave no room for any arguments. And if whatever higher power there was decided to favor him, then Naminé would not fight him with her usual sharpened sarcasm.

She began to pick at her nails, “I feel bad if you’re on the couch.”

No sarcasm. A bit of an argument, but no sarcasm.

He could meet her halfway if that was the case.

“Then do you want me to sleep with you in the bed again?” He asked, matter-of-factly. He was careful to not treat her any differently after her actions at the hospital, and this was a prime example of doing that. If he did it last night prior to her confession, then he could do it again tonight without things being off.

Her eyes widened for a moment as she shifted onto her hip, “that’s thoughtful, but no. How about I sleep on the couch in the library and you sleep in the bed. It’s your room after all.”

He glared, “you have a bad back.”

She sighed, “I’m aware. I’m on medication for it and I’m meeting with a guy from ortho tomorrow so he can look at it. I’ll sleep on the couch in the library and you’ll sleep in your room. That way I’m upstairs and you’re in your own bed. Everybody wins.” She actually sounded mildly pleased with herself for having come up with such an easy solution.

Tobirama watched her carefully, scrutinizing her where she stood in the doorway with her arms crossed. She seemed to have a hard time meeting his eyes after earlier, as her honey topaz irises darted away from his face if he looked at her a little too hard.

“What medication are you on?” He asked. He knew that out of everything she just said to him, that that was probably the point she wanted him to latch onto the least, but for him, it was the point he wanted to latch onto the most.

Her eyebrows knit together and a crease appeared in her forehead, “oxycodone and acetaminophen.”

“Oxy,” he muttered.

She ran her fingers through her hair, pushing it out of her face, “no, not _Oxy_. Oxycodone and acetaminophen. That’s Percocet. I’m taking it because my pain has been out of control for months now. It’s why I’m meeting with an orthopedic surgeon tomorrow.” Her biting sarcasm was only confined to the medical terminology, but when she explained why she was taking it, it evaporated on her tongue.

He could visibly see that it was taking every ounce of self control of hers to not blow up on him for bringing up such a sensitive topic, but she was managing it somehow for whatever reason. Maybe it was because of her confession at the hospital, or the way she held him moments before she came clean about how she felt, but she was showing more restraint than he expected. And he was actually a little impressed with it.

“You know why I had to ask,” he said, crossing his arms.

She closed her eyes and took in a deep breath to compose her temper.

“Yes. I know why you had to ask,” she conceded. “I’m not…” She trailed off and he could see the tension in her neck as she shifted onto her other hip. “I’m not a drug addict, okay?”

“I didn’t say you were,” he said.

She looked away from him. “No. I guess you didn’t.”

He looked at her for a long moment, thinking about what he said to her after she had put stitches in his knuckles. He had said she was timid and that she had changed.

Looking at her in that moment, standing in his doorway with her arms wrapped around herself as her eyes flickered between him and the floor, he only stood by his words more. The Naminé he grew up with would have never looked so anxious.

Naminé was not a timid person by any means. She was pigheaded and evasive and _difficult_ — _God_ she could be difficult. But he could see that a lot of those characteristics had been chipped away during that period she was gone, leaving behind a woman who was much more skittish than the Naminé Nakano he once knew.

And as annoying her biting remarks had been, and how irritated he could get with her, she didn’t fool him. She could never fool him. It was all just some shitty defense mechanism because Naminé didn’t like weakness, and the stuff with her stalker made her feel exactly that.

Leave it to Naminé to revert back to biting sarcasm to avoid looking weak.

He could have laughed because it was just so painfully _her_.

“…Do you want extra pillows if you intend to sleep in the library?” He asked when the silence didn’t seem to have a clear end in sight.

The corner of her lip curled upward as she straightened up, “oh I already stole extra pillows—extra blankets too.”

He smirked, “of course you did.”

“Of course I did,” she remarked. She uncrossed her arms to presumably walk away, but then she paused and bit down on her bottom lip and uttered out a soft, “hey, I know you’re busy. Just try to at least get a few hours of sleep, okay?”

He blinked a few times, not quite sure he heard her correctly. It was still so surprising to hear Naminé be so soft. Softness just never was her strong suit unless she was at the hospital and treating one of her patients.

But seeing that she was capable of eliciting such an emotion, no matter how brief, made his head spin a little with nostalgia.

“Okay,” he said quietly. She nodded and walked away, leaving him alone with his thoughts and work.

Tobirama rubbed his eyes.

Being pragmatic when it came to her was going to be easier said than done.

* * *

_“How the hell did you get a key to the pool?” Eighteen-year-old Tobirama asked, glaring at where Naminé was unlocking the door to their school’s indoor pool._

_“Izuna owed me a favor,” she said easily. She opened the door and grinned at him, the soft lighting of the room casting a pretty blue glow over her. “Without me he would have failed his Bio exam.”_

_“Mm,” he grunted as he crossed his arms._

_“Oh lighten up,” she said with a soft laugh._

_She walked further into the room, going over to the shallow end of the pool and sitting on the edge, dipping her feet in the water._

_Tobirama sighed and decided to indulge her, going to sit beside her and doing the same._

_“You’ve just been really stressed lately. I figured you might like something like this. I don’t know. There’s water and no one is around and it’s quiet—”_

_He silenced her by taking her hand and interlacing their fingers together._

_It really was a nice gesture and it was peaceful. These were his favorite type of moments with Naminé, when she showed her softer, less sarcastic, side and did something for him that she thought he would appreciate._

_She tended to have a pretty good track record when it came to that, especially when one considered the fact that she had been harsher lately after burying her father a few months ago._

_“This is nice,” he admitted._

_Her entire face lit up in a way that rivaled even Hashirama’s when he got excited, and Tobirama chuckled under his breath at how endearing the pure elation on her face was._

_“I’m glad,” she said. “I’ll have to make sure I keep track of how many favors Izuna owes me from now on.”_

_Tobirama rolled his eyes, “I don’t know what you see in him.”_

_She smirked and pulled her feet out of the water and stood up. He looked over his shoulder at where she was beginning to discard her clothes._

_“And I don’t know what you see in Asami,” she said, pulling her shirt over her head to reveal a white bikini top._

_His eyes lingered on her as she took her shorts off and pulled her long blonde hair out of its ponytail, running her fingers through it with a smirk on her face._

_“Like what you see?” She teased._

_He scoffed and looked away from her, choosing to focus his eyes on the still water of the pool. He hadn’t the faintest idea of where Naminé was taking him when she said to wear a pair of swim trunks and to meet her outside that night, but he had been skeptical. Naminé was known for having half baked schemes all for the sake of getting an adrenaline rush._

_That night on the beach last summer had been a perfect example of her ridiculous ideas._

_But this was different. This was nice._

_“You wanna go in with me?” She murmured, coming up behind him and wrapping her arms around his shoulders and kissing the shell of his ear._

_He sighed and let his eyes flutter shut while she began to place soft kisses on his neck._

_“I suppose,” he said. He started to feel hot all over and just wanted to get into the water to cool down or something._

_He put his hand to the back of his collar and pulled his shirt off, standing up to follow Naminé to the deep end. She stood on the edge of the pool, arms crossed as her eyes shamelessly raked over his chest._

_“Would you be mad if I pushed you in?” She asked with a grin._

_He smirked at her, “you could try, but I would just drag you in with me.”_

_She laughed and held her hands up in defeat, “okay, okay.”_

_Naminé turned away from him and sat down on the edge of the pool, and then pushed herself off to get in carefully, going completely under as she did. He crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow as he waited for her to come back up, and when she did she grinned._

_“Why are you looking at me like that?”_

_“I expected you to show off and do a flip,” he said easily._

_She laughed again, wading further out into the deep end, “I’m not the one on the swim team. That’s all you, Pal.” Even in the dim light he could see her smile widen. “Come on. Put your money where your mouth is.”_

_He smirked and shook his head, choosing to take a few steps back so he had some momentum to launch himself of the side of the pool and do an easy somersault in the air._

_When he resurfaced he heard her whooping from the other side of the deep end and warmth spread through his chest when he could see the cheesy grin on her face._

_She was right, he had been stressed and needed to relax. And casually swimming in a pool at night, with no one but his girlfriend around seemed to be the best way to do that._

_They swam around for a little while, messing around with each other, jumping off the diving board, and just overall decompressing._

_It was just really nice._

_After a while they ended up in the shallow end, Tobirama standing up to his ribs in water, raising an eyebrow at where Naminé was attempting to float on her back and miserably failing._

_“It’s not that difficult,” he said when she tried again and failed as she sank into the water._

_“Okay we all can’t secretly be part mer-folk like you,” she said a little sarcastically, but not enough for her words to have any real bite to them._

_He shook his head, “do it again.”_

_She sighed dramatically, but followed his instructions and attempted to float on her back one more time._

_Only this time, just when she was about to sink again, he shifted over to her and put his hands on the smooth planes of her back to hold her up._

_A sly smile appeared on her face, “you copping a feel?”_

_He smirked at her, “I can ‘cop a feel’ whenever I want.”_

_She snickered and closed her eyes, “true.”_

_He held her there for another few moments and watched as the tension seeped out of her body and her face. Then when she was completely relaxed, he very slowly moved his hands away from her and smirked again when she floated without being held up._

_“Now you’re part mer-folk,” he said casually._

_Naminé’s eyes opened and then just like that, she was sinking again._

_Tobirama pinched the bridge of his nose, “you’re insufferable.”_

_She stood up in the shallow water and pushed her long hair back with a laugh, not at all bothered with his comment and said, “I like it better when you hold me up.”_

_He rolled his eyes, “that’s because you’re obnoxious.”_

_She shrugged and came over to him, wrapping her arms around his neck and leaning into his chest, “yet you still put up with me for some reason.”_

_Tobirama’s arms snaked around her waist and he rested his back against the edge of the pool and said a soft, “yet I still put up with you for some reason.”_

_She grinned and bent forward to give him a gentle kiss._

_Tobirama sighed against her lips and brought one of his hands that had initially been around her waist up to the back of her head so he could knot his fingers in her hair._

_Her lips were wet and cold from the water, but when she deepened the kiss by running her tongue along his lower lip, his entire body felt hot, and he pulled her body flush against his and kissed her harder._

_A satisfied hum came from the back of her throat and she raked her teeth across his lip. He grunted at the waves of pleasure from the heated kiss and easily flipped them around so she was the one with her back against the wall._

_He moved to her neck, dipping his head down to press hot kisses all the way down the soft skin there and to the base of her throat, occasionally biting and making her squirm against him._

_“You’re going to leave a mark,” she whimpered, her voice soft and nothing more than a breath._

_He came back up to put his lips right at her ear, the hand around her waist coming up to caress her sides._

_“Is that a bad thing?” He murmured._

_She sucked in a breath when his hand slid down her back, pausing to squeeze her hips, and then slid to her backside and squeezed again._

_“No,” she muttered weakly as she knotted her hands in his hair and dragged him back in for another heated kiss._

_With his lips back on hers, her hands explored his chest and she occasionally raked her nails across it when he squeezed her a little harder than he intended, or when he bit her own lip hard enough to bruise._

_“Tobirama,” she said through heavy breaths, no longer kissing him. Her lips ghosted against his, a silent tease that dared him to take it further._

_So he did._

_He kissed her again, pinning her harder against the wall as his hands trailed up her back, finding the two strings that tied her bikini top on and tugged on them both until they loosened enough for him to pull her top off completely._

_She sighed into his mouth as one of her hands tugged on his hair while the other trailed further down his chest and down his abdomen, boldly palming the front of his swim trunks._

_He groaned and shifted his knee between her legs to push them apart as his fingers slipped beneath her bikini bottoms, rubbing the soft heat between her thighs and eliciting a gasp from her swollen lips._

_“Tobirama—”_

_* * *_

“Tobirama. Hey, Tobirama.”

Tobirama sucked in a sharp breath and blinked, rubbing his eyes to lift the veil of sleep from his head that clouded his vision.

“Naminé?” he muttered, confused when a much older Naminé than the one from his dream came into focus. The Naminé in front of him had lines on her face, indents around her mouth from years of smiles and crinkles at the corner of her eyes. The Naminé in front of him had blonde hair that just barely brushed her shoulders, much shorter than the version of her from his dream with hair that reached her chest.

He felt so confused as he looked at her, still trapped in those first powerful moments of sleep inertia.

“It’s almost four in the morning. You should be in bed,” she said quietly, her voice soft enough to make his chest hurt from the long lost memories of his dreams.

He shook his head, “I have work.”

“You’re not going to get any quality work done when you’re this tired,” she whispered, appealing to the logical side of himself, probably knowing that it was the best way to get him to concede to her.

“It’s fine,” he grunted, but his eyelids were heavy with exhaustion. He wasn’t sure when he fell asleep, but he vaguely remembered finishing four of the five remaining 8-K’s. If he completed that many, then he must have only fallen asleep only about a half hour ago.

“Tobirama,” she said under her breath when he could feel his eyelids betraying him and getting heavier until they closed without his permission. He could feel her hands wrapping around one of his arms as she whispered, “come on, you should be in bed.”

It was almost like he was stuck in quicksand, trying to fight his body that was betraying him by forcing him to fall in and out of sleep like this. If his own desires meant anything to his basic biological needs, he would have been wide awake and finished that final 8-K.

But his body clearly didn’t give a shit about his desires, because he was falling back into a hazy slumber again.

“Tobirama, wake up,” Naminé’s soothing voice cut through the heavy fog that was sleep and just like that, he was opening his eyes again, blinking at her and waiting for everything to come into focus.

“Come on. Go to bed,” she said again as she gradually tugged on his arm to get him up from his desk.

Maybe it was the fact that he was lost in a mist of exhaustion, or the fact that he just woke up from a dream that was an old memory of the insufferable woman in front of him, but he nodded and began to stand up.

She released his arm when he got up of his own accord and he he found himself missing the warmth of her touch.

He blamed it on his fatigue.

Afterwards, he wasn’t sure when she left him alone, but eventually she did. Because before he really even registered it, Tobirama was alone in his dark room.

He let out a sigh and unbuttoned the rest of his shirt and peeled it off, tossing it on the floor. He then did the same with his belt, unbuckling it and letting it fall on top of his dress shirt, and then did the same with his pants. He didn’t even bother changing into a pair of sweatpants or even brushing his teeth.

He was just too goddamn tired.

Tobirama collapsed onto his mattress, rolling onto his stomach and folding his arms over his head.

And then just like that, sleep claimed him once again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I actually went back and reworked parts of chapters 6, 8, 9, 10, & 11\. Nothing major changed, just a few scenes. I mean if you wanna go back and read any of them, maybe just read chapter 8 since that had the most changes? But legit, no need to go back and reread unless you want to for some reason!
> 
> Also slower/shorter chapter, but that was intended since this is the midpoint!
> 
> Drop a comment if you feel like it!
> 
> I also promise I'll eventually get all the typos. Once again, I THINK I get them all and my friend swears she gets them all and then LOLJK NOPE.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Not a doctor not a doctor not a doctor.

“Aren’t you a little ray of sunshine in the morning,” Kurenai teased when Naminé got in her car at six-thirty in the morning. Naminé groaned and rested her head on the back of the seat, trying desperately to wake up already.

“What happened to your car?” Kurenai asked when she backed out of Tobirama’s driveway and caught sight of the shattered windshield.

“Branch fell,” Naminé lied. “I gotta call someone to replace it today.”

“Asuma might know someone that could fix it if you need,” Kurenai suggested. “One of his friends from college owns a shop and he’s helped me out more times than I can count.”

“That would actually be great,” Naminé said, turning her head to look at the nurse. “I can’t get it to a shop with my hours so to have someone just come fix it would be ideal.”

“Well Asuma is gonna look at your back today, right? Tell him I told you to ask him about Ibiki. I’m sure he won’t mind.”

“Will do,” Naminé said. “Hey speaking of, I’m curious. How serious are you and Asuma?”

Kurenai blushed and cleared her throat, “what do you mean?”

“Well are you guys just hooking up, are you a couple, do you see a future with him? That kind of stuff,” Naminé said with a yawn.

“We’re a couple,” Kurenai said under her breath. “And yeah, I guess. I haven’t really given it much thought. I’d like to have a family one day, but I don’t want to rush it.”

Naminé nodded but didn’t press the subject since Kurenai was still very clearly flustered at the thought of the ortho resident.

“What about you, Doc? You want a family?” Kurenai asked after a few moments of silence.

Naminé smirked and shot a look at Kurenai, “I feel like you should really start calling me Naminé. You’re like my only friend.”

Kurenai smirked back, “I feel like that would be weird, and I’m not your only friend. You’ve got me, Kagami, and I’d say Asuma has potential to be one of your friends since he doesn’t scare easily.”

Naminé actually laughed, “the hell does that mean?”

“It means you’re a piece of work.”

Naminé just shook her head and laughed lightly, “so I’ve been told.”

“Well? You want a family?”

“I don’t know,” Naminé admitted. “I don’t think I’d be a good mother. My mom was a colossal fuck up, my dad was a pretty strict guy, and they say the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree for a reason.”

“Harsh,” Kurenai pointed out. “You don’t really mean that, do you?”

Naminé shrugged, “just being honest. I’m a colossal fuck up too so hey, it’s warranted.”

“I’m gonna pretend like you didn’t just say that since your job alone proves that you aren’t.”

“Yeah well,” Naminé said as she crossed her arms and rested her head against the window. “Regardless, I don’t think I’d make a good mother. Which is fine because it’s not like I have suitors lining up to marry or start a family with me anyway.”

She cracked a grin and turned her head to look at Kurenai, but Kurenai was only scoffing as she rolled her eyes.

“Does that mean we can talk about the fact that you’re staying with your ex and have been for a few days even though the pipes have probably already been fixed in your house? Or no?”

Naminé blinked dumbly, having almost forgotten about the fact that she had told Kurenai she was staying with Tobirama because the pipes at her place burst.

“No,” Naminé mumbled.

“You know, maybe you’d feel better and less like a fuck up if you talked to someone about all of your deep dark secrets.”

“I don’t talk to people about that kind of stuff,” Naminé tried.

“You don’t. You just get sarcastic and vague and twitchy. Makes me wonder what you and your ex were like together—speaking of, I don’t even know his name. I know where he lives, what car he drives, what he looks like, but I don’t know his name.”

Naminé plunged her hands into her pockets and sank deeper into her seat and mumbled a quiet, “his name is Tobirama.”

There was a pause from Kurenai and then she was looking at Naminé, “Tobirama? Like… Tobirama Senju? One of the founders of Konoha Enterprises?”

Oh man. Naminé was going to be sick.

“That would be the one,” she muttered.

“Holy shit you know the Senju brothers?” Kurenai took a brief look at the road as they got closer to the hospital and then immediately put her attention back on Naminé.

“I grew up with them,” Naminé said, absolutely refusing to look at Kurenai directly and instead watched her through her peripheral vision. “Dr. Matsuo did too.”

“Holy shit,” Kurenai breathed out, putting a hand to her head as the hospital came into view. “You were going to marry into the Senju family?”

Naminé’s jaw locked, “yeah. Didn’t really care about all of that though.”

“You didn’t care about the fact that you could have married into one of the richest families in the country?”

Naminé couldn’t help it when she glared at Kurenai, “of course not. I’ve had a crush on Tobirama since I was like six or seven. I dated him all through high school, college, and med school. I didn’t give a shit about the money… And just throwing this out there, but they weren’t one of the richest families in the country when I knew them.”

“Hey hang on, I didn’t mean it like that,” Kurenai said when she could feel Naminé’s glare on her. They pulled into the hospital parking lot and got out of the car, Kurenai walking right beside Naminé. “I was just surprised.”

“It’s all right,” Naminé said. “I’m sorry. It’s just a touchy subject in case you couldn’t tell.”

Kurenai patted her on the back, “trust me. I could tell.”

They were quiet as they walked down to the locker room to change into their scrubs, and when the silence stretched on a little longer than comfortable, Kurenai broke it.

“I know it’s a touchy subject, but do you still love him?”

Naminé stopped dead in her tracks, and Kurenai stopped with her too, seemingly prepared for that.

“I…” She what? She didn’t still love him? She didn’t know how she felt? She knew all right. She just hadn’t actually admitted it to herself yet.

Kurenai gave her a sympathetic smile, “it’s okay, Doc. That was plenty answer enough.”

Naminé rubbed her temples and resumed walking, going straight for her locker and grabbing her navy blue scrubs which indicated that she was an attending surgeon.

“It doesn’t matter how I feel,” she grumbled, peeling her shirt off. “I left him and didn’t come back. So if he hated my guts, I wouldn’t blame him at all. And honestly, he might.”

She thought about last night and the way she hugged him tightly and the way his hands rested on her hips as he told her that he didn’t know how he felt about what she said to him. So okay. Maybe saying that he hated her guts was a bit of a stretch.

“Any guy who lets you stay with him for an indeterminate period of time doesn’t hate your guts,” Kurenai said with ease. “But then again, I don’t know all of your deep dark secrets, so maybe he does.”

Kurenai flashed her a smirk and Naminé laughed in spite of herself, slipping on her white coat and tangling her fingers in her scrub cap.

“Yeah, we might have to change that.”

* * *

“So you get to finally leave today,” Naminé said as she walked into Kanna’s hospital room, grabbing her chart and looking it over. Everything looked really good and Naminé sighed with relief.

Kanna sat up in her bed and gave Naminé a broad smile, “I’ve been wondering where you were.”

Naminé sat down on the edge of her bed, “I’m sorry, I’ve been crazy busy lately. Where’s your mom, Hon?”

“Work. She’s gonna pick me up later this afternoon.”

Naminé nodded, “excited to be out of here?”

“You have no idea,” Kanna said as she laughed lightly.

“I bet. You’re not even a teenager and you’ve already been shot and had brain surgery. You’re pretty durable,” she said, nudging Kanna softly in the arm.

Kanna gave her that same broad smile, “well hopefully I won’t need to be this durable again.”

“Agreed,” Naminé said with a nod. Then she winked, “excited to see Ashura?”

Kanna’s pale face flushed, “I can’t believe you said that!”

Naminé couldn’t help it when she almost cackled, “I’m sorry! I couldn’t help myself. I’m known to be a giant pain in the neck.”

Kanna shook her head but gave her a small smile that indicated she wasn’t actually upset with Naminé for mentioning the boy she had a crush on.

“You’re the trauma surgeon, right?” She asked. Naminé nodded and Kanna continued. “I heard some of the nurses talking about you the other day. Something about you calling another doctor a stupid… You know.”

Naminé laughed, “I do. Yeah, that’s what happens when you’re a giant pain in the neck. Your coworkers talk smack about you. So learn from my mistakes, yeah?”

Kanna grinned, “why’d you say it?”

“Because I don’t know how to control my temper,” Naminé remarked, wagging her finger for almost comedic effect. “Remember that when some girl tries to make you mad by flirting with Ashura in front of you.”

“ _Oh_ ,” Kanna said with her eyes getting bigger. “That’s why you called her that.”

Naminé snickered, “not really.”

“That’s okay, I won’t tell anyone,” Kanna promised, and Naminé’s heart suddenly felt fifty times larger as she regarded the twelve-year-old that almost seemed like a little sister.

“Thanks,” Naminé said with a smile of her own.

“I probably won’t see you again, so I wanted to say thank you. I know that doctors have to be really professional and kinda distant, but you made me feel a lot better throughout this whole thing,” Kanna looked down as she said it, probably feeling a little embarrassed.

Naminé smiled warmly, “not a problem. I’m just glad you’re finally healthy enough to leave.” Then she got an idea and looked around the room for a piece of paper, but came up empty handed. She dug through her pockets and pulled out a pen and a sticky note she had. There wasn’t anything too important on it, just a reminder for her to finish her one report. So she flipped it over and began to jot something down.

“If you’re ever in a pinch and need someone to get you out of trouble but don’t want to call your parents for some reason, give me a call. I’d rather you be safe than sorry because you didn’t want your parents yelling at you for partying or something,” she said. She scribbled her phone number down along with her first name and handed it to Kanna.

“Really, Dr. Nakano?” She asked as her eyebrows began to knit together.

“Absolutely,” Naminé said. She remembered a time when she was much younger and when Hiruzen Sarutobi did the same thing for her. “My only condition is that you have to call me Naminé instead of Dr. Nakano.”

“O-okay,” Kanna said as her face began to brighten.

Naminé gave her a soft smile and put her hand on the girl’s shoulder, “don’t take this the wrong way, but I hope I never see you in here again.”

Kanna grinned, “me either.”

Naminé left afterwards, wishing Kanna the very best and headed down to ortho to meet with Asuma so he could look over her CT scan she got earlier.

When she got down there Asuma had just walked out of a patient’s room, nodding when Naminé came into view.

“I got your results,” Asuma said. He gestured for her to follow him into an unoccupied room farther down the hall.

“Great,” Naminé said.

“Not great,” Asuma said back as he rubbed the back of his neck.

“Why?” Naminé asked as she crossed her arms.

He pinned her scans up against the light and gestured to three distinct places in her spine, “you said you were in a car accident?”

Even though her eyes weren’t trained to pick up on the same things that Asuma’s were, just because of the nature of their different specialties, she still could clearly see what he was pointing out.

“Yeah,” she muttered. “Broke my back in three places. Almost died actually.”

“I’m not surprised,” he said. “You’ve got a sort of post traumatic arthritis, Nakano.”

Naminé bit down on the back of her bottom lip, “is this the part where you tell me to exercise and take aspirin or ibuprofen for the rest of my life because I’m shit out of luck?”

Asuma frowned, “you know the treatment for arthritis.” She must have looked particularly disheartened or something, because he started talking about treatments again. “I could maybe give you a cortisone injection, but you know how this works. There’s not a whole lot I can do.”

She knew there wasn’t much he could do, but that didn’t make her fingertips itch any less. And then they itched even more when she could see Tobirama in the back of her head, asking her what kind of medication she was on.

God, she really was a colossal fuck up like her mother, wasn’t she?

“Your pain is really bad, isn’t it?” Asuma asked.

Naminé’s eyes flickered to him and she gave him a bitter smile, “it’s okay. I’m pretty much used to it at this point.”

Asuma huffed, “I can’t let one of Kurenai’s friends walk around in this much pain.”

She shrugged, “it’s okay, Dr. Sarutobi.”

“Okay look,” Asuma pulled her scans down. “I’ll tell Chief to refill your Percocet until you find something that works. I’ll even help you look at all that homeopathic shit in case something like that helps. Deal?”

She narrowed her eyes, “are you sure?”

“Positive,” Asuma said right away. “I’m serious. I can’t let Kurenai’s friend walk around all day with this much pain.”

The relief she felt when she realized she would have more pills was enough to make her sick to her stomach, but she felt it nonetheless.

“Thanks,” she said under her breath.

“No problem.”

“Hey, since you mentioned Kurenai, I’m having some car trouble and she told me to ask you about your friend Ibiki? She said maybe he could look at it since I can’t get my car to a shop with my hours,” Naminé said, eager to change the subject.

Asuma nodded, “yeah that shouldn’t be a problem. I can give you his number. You need your car towed or something?”

“I don’t think so, but the windshield is all busted up and who knows what else is wrong with it,” she admitted. For all she knew, Hidan could have messed with her brakes or transmission or something else without her knowing. If he was crazy enough to come to Hidden Leaf Hospital when she was getting off work, then he was crazy enough to try and mess with her car in less obvious ways.

“That sucks. Don’t go anywhere. Let me give you his number,” Asuma said as fished his phone out of his pocket.

Naminé pulled her own phone out, ready to take down the number.

The sooner she got her car fixed, the better.

* * *

Tobirama was exhausted.

His eyes burned, he had a headache, his knuckles throbbed, and he had a goddamn kink in his neck from passing out at his desk that was just downright annoying. He woke up a little after Naminé left and got to the office early to complete that last 8-K, so to say he was a little sleep deprived was a bit of an understatement.

Shikaku Nara had been downright ecstatic that they were all done so he could go ahead and publish the forms right away and thanked him profusely.

Tobirama then retreated to the conference room that he and Hashirama were sharing as an office and nursed a black cup of coffee as he tried to wake up.

“You look awful,” Hashirama said when he sat down across from Tobirama and set up his laptop.

“I was up all night reviewing the 8-K’s,” Tobirama muttered. He didn’t even have the energy to glare at his brother. He just leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes as he took a long swig of coffee.

“Well I know Shikaku really apprec—what the hell happened to your hand?”

Tobirama’s eyes opened when his brother grabbed his wrist that was holding his coffee cup and inspected his knuckles with the stitches in them.

“ _Brother_ ,” Tobirama reprimanded when he almost spilled his coffee because of Hashirama gripping his wrist.

“Well?” Hashirama demanded. “What the hell happened?”

Tobirama withheld a sigh, “I punched a pillar.”

Hashirama blinked at him, “huh?”

Tobirama’s eye twitched and he repeated himself, “I punched a pillar.”

“What? Where? _Why?_ ” Hashirama pressed.

“Brother, enough,” Tobirama stated as he crossed his arms and glared as hard as he could, which really wasn’t all that hard considering how tired he was.

“Did you and Naminé get into a fight or something?”

Tobirama rubbed his eyes, “of course not.”

“Then what happened?”

He huffed, “her stalker showed up when I was picking her up from work last night. He got in her face and I lost my temper, so I punched the pillar and Naminé insisted that I needed stitches.”

Before Hashirama could say anything, Minato and Jiraiya walked in.

“Morning,” Jiraiya said as he sipped on a cup of coffee. “Ready for the next round of interviews?”

Tobirama stood up and grabbed his laptop, thankful for the interruption.

“Let’s go,” he said.

He was all too aware of Hashirama huffing and puffing behind him, but he couldn’t press the issue around their CEO and CFO, so he begrudgingly dropped it.

They moved into another conference room where they would spend the next three hours holding interviews for a new chief legal counsel and Tobirama couldn’t help it when he tuned out the idle conversation that Minato and Jiraiya were having with Hashirama. He was just too tired to try and pretend that he was interested.

Hell, he was almost too tired to even sit through the interviews.

“Tobirama,” Hashirama said.

Tobirama’s eyes flickered over to where his brother was with chatting with Minato and Jiraiya, “what?”

“Minato was thanking you for going over those 8-K’s,” Hashirama said as he narrowed his eyes in suspicion.

Tobirama looked at Minato and nodded before he went back to staring at his computer.

He just couldn’t focus.

His attention was torn somewhere between that annoying kink in his neck, his lack of any quality sleep, and an insufferable blonde doctor.

She just wouldn’t get the hell out of his head and he was getting sick of it.

Where was his self control?

Then before he knew it, the secretary was bringing in one of the candidates for the position and Tobirama went through the motions without much thought. He asked questions when expected of him, took notes on his computer, glared when the candidate said something that clashed with what they were looking for, and played the role of the scary interviewer.

But he wasn’t really paying attention. Not actually anyway.

He blamed his lack of focus on the fact that he only got around three hours of sleep.

His mind flickered to Naminé and he held in a sigh.

_‘I want you. Not even in a romantic sense or whatever. I just… I miss you, okay? I miss you and Toka and Hashirama, and that’s not okay. But I do.’_

If she didn’t want him in a romantic sense, then how did she want him?

And if she didn’t want him in a romantic sense, then why had she embraced him, and why had she been so soft with him?

And why the hell hadn’t he showed more restraint? Why had he felt the need to embrace her back and why had he touched her the way he had? And why in the world did he have that stupid dream last night?

For Christ’s sake, what the hell was _wrong_ with him?

“Tobirama?”

It was Hashirama’s voice, ripping him away from his thoughts.

Tobirama blinked and looked over at his brother, a little surprised when he caught Minato and Jiraiya both getting up from their seats and nodding at Hashirama before they stepped out.

What had he missed?

“Do you want to stretch your legs? We’ve got a thirty-minute break,” Hashirama said it carefully, as if he didn’t want to startle him.

“Mm,” Tobirama mumbled.

“You seem a little distracted,” Hashirama said as he stood up from his chair and put his hands on his hips, raising one eyebrow above the other.

“I’m fine,” he stood up and crossed his arms.

“Right,” Hashirama said, still looking at him with that heavy suspicion. “Well let’s go take a w—”

“What are your thoughts on Naminé being back here?” Tobirama asked abruptly.

Hashirama stared at him, jaw going slack, “what?”

Tobirama didn’t say anything back to him. He just waited.

Hashirama cleared his throat, “well you know I’m glad she’s back. She’s family, Tobirama.”

“And what do you think about her staying with me?”

He could see that it was taking all of his brother’s willpower to not start gawking at him. Hashirama narrowed his eyes and went on, “I think it’s a good thing. She has a stalker and she’s scared and you make her feel safe so—”

“What?” Tobirama cut off, feeling his face settle into a glare.

Hashirama blinked, “‘what’ what?”

“You think I make her feel safe? After all this time?” Tobirama couldn’t help it when he let out a harsh scoff.

It was Hashirama’s turn to scoff, “as a matter of fact I do. Why else do you think she’s staying with you instead of me?”

Tobirama shook his head, “she’s already made it abundantly clear that it’s because Mito is pregnant.”

Hashirama rolled his eyes, “that’s what she’s telling herself and you so neither of you have to address the elephant in the room.” Tobirama glared but Hashirama went on. “If the two of you really hated each other that much, then she would bite her tongue and stay with me. Why are you asking me this? Did something happen between you two?”

Tobirama’s jaw clenched, “no.”

Hashirama didn’t buy it, because he was smirking at him with his eyebrows raised mischievously, “oh of course. So she has nothing to do with why you’ve been so distracted?”

Tobirama glared hard enough to pop a blood vessel, “ _no_.”

Hashirama didn’t say anything, he just laughed and patted him on the back, ushering him out of the conference room.

“Yeah okay. Come on. I need a break.”

* * *

“What do you mean Ibiki had to tow your car?” Kurenai asked as she pulled out of the hospital a little before eight o’clock.

“I don’t know,” Naminé grumbled. “He said he got there to replace the windshield but saw that it was leaking oil really badly. He said if I left it then it would eventually screw up my engine so he just towed it to have a look.”

“You have awful luck,” Kurenai said. “Where am I going?”

“Make a right at the next light,” Naminé said. Kurenai was seriously a life saver, agreeing to drop her off at Toka’s law firm after work and promising that she could take her to work tomorrow morning too.

“So is this late night law firm visit another one of your deep dark secrets?”

Naminé snickered, “that would be correct.”

“Of course. So I’m not allowed to know,” Kurenai said.

“Yeah, I meant it when I said that we were going to have to fix that,” Naminé said.

“Well I’d love to be enlightened,” Kurenai said with a smirk.

Naminé smiled softly and rested her head against the window, “we’ll get together one night and I’ll fill you in.”

“I’ll bring the tequila.”

Naminé let out a soft laugh. Maybe telling Kurenai all of her deep dark secrets would be good for her.

She was just getting so tired of all the stupid lies…

When Kurenai pulled up to the law firm Naminé grabbed her stuff and got out of the car, thanking her profusely for helping her out. Kurenai promised her it was no problem and that she would see her in the morning, and then pulled away.

Naminé plunged her hands in her pockets and waited for Toka to let her in the building, constantly looking over her shoulder in case some Jashinist showed up to kidnap her something.

“Hey,” Toka greeted, opening the door and ushering Naminé inside.

Naminé let out a sigh of relief as soon as she was out of the cold.

“Did someone drop you off?” Toka asked as her eyebrows knitted themselves together.

“Oh,” Naminé frowned when she realized how many things she had to tell Toka about. “Yeah, someone smashed my windshield, so Tobirama had to drive me to work the other day, apparently my car is now leaking oil and got towed a little bit ago, oh and when Tobirama picked me up from work Hidan may or may not have shown up and Tobirama may or may not have threatened him.”

Toka stared at her, her dark red lips parting in shock.

“I leave you alone for what? Two days and this is what happens?” She deadpanned.

Naminé gave her a sheepish smile, “looks like it.”

Toka pinched the bridge of her nose and groaned, “you just said so many things that make me want to wring your goddamn neck.”

Naminé swallowed hard, “Toka—”

“Please for the love of fuck, tell me that Tobirama did not leave a scratch on him.”

Naminé was quick to shake her head, “no! No not at all! And Hidan instigated it. Tobirama wasn’t even going to do anything but then Hidan grabbed my ponytail and—”

“He what?” Toka deadpanned.

Naminé winced, “grabbed my ponytail.”

Toka huffed and ran her hands over her face, “and then Tobirama lost his shit, didn’t he?”

“Yeah,” Naminé mumbled.

“Whatever. As long as he didn’t actually leave a scratch on Hidan it’s fine. I just need to be prepared to use it in case his attorney brings it up,” Toka murmured under her breath, seemingly more to herself than to Naminé. Her eyes then flashed to Naminé and she sighed, “come on. We need to prep your testimony.”

About five minutes into it, Naminé realized that ‘prepping the testimony’ basically just consisted of Toka raking her over the coals to make sure that every single word she said matched the details of the police records and the other accounts of the event itself, and events leading up to it.

About forty-five minutes into it, Naminé let out a sigh and rubbed her temples, “do you have to be so harsh?”

Toka snorted, “I look like a teddy bear compared to the defense attorney.”

“Sounds terrifying,” Naminé said. “So who’s the other witness you’re bringing in?”

Toka made a note on her tablet, “Dr. Hikaku Uchiha. He’s the one that found you, right?”

Naminé winced, fighting off a memory of lying in an alley as she bled out and one of the doctors she went out with calling 911 and trying to stop the bleeding, “…yeah.”

Toka looked up from her tablet, “I don’t have to worry about him being a hostile witness, do I?”

Naminé shook her head, “no. I just hate reliving this.”

Toka’s eyes softened, “I know. I’m sorry.”

Naminé cleared her throat and looked up at the overhead lights to try and get better composure of herself.

“Are you sure you don’t want anyone there the day you testify?” Toka asked.

Naminé pursed her lips, “I’ll have you.”

“I know, but I’m going to have to focus on the trial. I really think it would be good if you had someone there with you. I’ve done this sort of thing more times than I care to admit, and from experience I can promise you that it generally goes much smoother when you’re not alone.”

“How?” Naminé asked.

“In the past when my client has gotten on the stand without anyone there for moral support, they’ve fallen apart when cross examined,” Toka said. She leaned back in her chair and crossed her arms, holding Naminé in a steady gaze.

“Yeah but how will having someone there change that?”

“You might not feel so alone,” Toka said. “I just think it would be a good idea. And since you’re paying me to do this, I think you should take my advice.”

The corner of Naminé’s lips pulled downward, “I don’t want anyone there because I don’t want to be looked at like I’m broken, or pitied, and I don’t want someone to think that I can’t operate because of my mental state, okay? I’m fine. I just want this to be over.”

“I get that,” Toka said. She uncrossed her arms and rested her elbows on the desk.

“But you’re still going to tell me to bring someone.”

Toka shrugged, “it’s up to you. But for what it’s worth, Tobirama wouldn’t look at you any differently.” Naminé didn’t miss the way Toka grimaced. “You walked out on him the day you were supposed to get married and he still looks at you the same way—albeit he glares a little more.”

Naminé pulled the sleeves of her shirt over her hands, “Toka, I don’t get you. You hate that I’m back here, you hate that I’m staying with him, but you want me to ask him to be there when I testify?”

Toka let out a heavy sigh, “I don’t actually hate that you’re back. And don’t get me wrong, I’m definitely pissed about the Tobirama thing—but I’m not stupid. I know how you feel about him and I know that having him there will make you feel better.”

“How do you know how I feel about him when I don’t even know how I feel?” Naminé asked as a bitter smile came across her face. She knew she missed him and knew that deep down she wanted him in her life again, but that was about it because she still was so confused about the whole thing and was racked with guilt whenever she gave it too much thought.

Toka scoffed, “are you kidding me?”

“No,” Naminé said with a glare.

“Okay,” Toka rolled her eyes. “I know you’re trying to act all casual and like you don’t still give a shit, but you’re not fooling me. I know you still care about him.”

Her words stung because of how painfully true they were, and because Toka could see right through her. Naminé looked down at her hands, “of course I still care about him. I still care about everyone, yourself included.”

She thought back to standing in front of Tobirama, him asking her what she wanted from him, and her coming clean to missing him and Hashirama and Toka and all of it.

She heard Toka take in a long breath and Naminé’s eyes flickered back up to the Senju woman. She frowned and crossed her arms, “I know you do, Naminé. You’re not as cold hearted as you think you are.”

Naminé chuckled, “yeah. You were always better at that.”

Toka snorted, but there was a small smirk on her face, “whatever.”

A comfortable silence settled over the two of them, Toka just blankly staring at her tablet and Naminé quietly picking her nails. But it didn’t feel tense. If anything, it was the most comfortable Naminé had felt with Toka since she first came back.

“What are you going to do when all of this is put to rest?” Toka asked, her voice softer than it had been since Naminé arrived.

“What do you mean?”

“You’re not going to run away again, are you?” Toka’s eyes were steady and calm when she said it, and Naminé felt a wave of warm nostalgia rush over her.

Leave it to the Senju’s to always find a way to be stable enough for her to hold onto.

“No,” Naminé told her with ease. “I couldn’t even if I wanted to. I’m locked into a five-year contract with the hospital.”

Toka let out a short laugh, “always comes back to work with you.”

The corner of Naminé’s lips quirked upward, “I’m proud of what I do.”

“You should be. You’re a healer.”

“I never thought of it like that,” Naminé admitted. She had days where she doubted her career choice, mainly when she lost too many patients, or got tired of patching up gangbangers after a shooting. But overall, she really was proud of what she did. But never had she ever thought of herself as a healer.

She always thought the cardio people and neurosurgeons were. Hell, even Asami was more of a healer. The woman could operate on infants for crying out loud. What could Naminé do that even came close to that?

But the way Toka said it made her think that maybe she had a point.

“Surprising,” Toka said. “Hopefully once this stuff with your stalker is over with you’ll be able to heal yourself. Otherwise Tobirama will never take you back.”

Naminé’s entire face flushed and her heart felt like it skipped a thousand beats, “huh?”

“Well that’s what you want, isn’t it?” Toka asked. She looked at Naminé so casually, so nonchalantly, that Naminé actually had half the mind to wonder if she wasn’t referring to something completely different. Toka gave her a bitter smirk, “that’s what you’ve always wanted.”

“I don’t…” Naminé trailed off. She didn’t have it in her to argue, because she was right. “The whole reason I tried to avoid him and Hashirama and you when I came back was because I knew that if I was around you people that I was going to want things to be how they used to. And you can’t go backwards.”

“Your father always said that,” Toka said with a hum. “And I would usually agree.”

“But?” Naminé asked, feeling like she had to hold her breath for some reason.

“But we’re not your past, Naminé. We’re your family,” Toka said. “I can’t believe I just said that. Normally Hashirama is the one who does the touchy feely crap.” Toka shivered for extra effect. “Ugh, I feel like I need to take a shower after that.”

Naminé blinked at her a few times, not even aware of the slow smile that was coming over her face.

“Does that mean you forgive me?” Naminé asked.

Toka looked at her long and hard, eventually letting out an exasperated huff, “it means that I might be able to one day.”

“Well if you can forgive me one day then maybe I can forgive myself too,” Naminé said as she rested her cheek against her hand.

Toka rolled her eyes, “I hate how touchy feely you’ve become.”

Naminé waved her hand in a dismissive gesture, “whatever.”

Toka smirked at her and Naminé smirked back.

“I still think you should bring someone when you testify,” Toka stated.

Naminé nodded, tilting her chin up ever so slightly.

“All right then. If you think it’s best, I’ll talk to Tobirama.”

* * *

Tobirama stood in the kitchen as he nursed a cup of tea, taking a temporary break from his work. He rolled out his shoulders and tried to rub the kink out of his neck from falling asleep at his desk last night, but it was to no avail. Part of him almost wished Naminé was home so she could help, but another part of him immediately scolded himself for even thinking that.

Her car hadn’t been there when he got back, so he assumed she must have called someone to tow it or whatever while she was at work. And that was definitely a good thing. He would worry less about her if her car was repaired.

It was already close to ten when his phone went off in his pocket, and he fished it out with a sigh. He expected it to be a text from Naminé that asked if he could pick her up from Toka’s firm or something of the sort, but it wasn’t.

It was from Asami?

_‘Hey I got off work a little bit ago. Can I stop by?’_

He glared at the small screen and typed back a short response.

_‘Busy’_

But Asami must have already been pulling into his driveway because as soon as he sent the text, his doorbell rang.

Tobirama continued to scowl as he walked to his front door and opened it to see Asami standing there, looking down at her phone.

He crossed his arms and glared.

“Sorry,” she said. “I was already on my way.”

“Mm,” he muttered. “Did you need something?”

“Can I come in?” She asked as she plunged her hands into the pockets of her jacket.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” he said. He felt a little guilty that he was making her stand out in the cold, but he really didn’t want to deal with her. He had work he had to do and didn’t have the time or energy to have the conversation he knew she wanted to have.

“Why?” She asked as her lips began to pucker into a sort of pout. He couldn’t even count how many times he had seen that exact expression on her face in his lifetime.

“I’m busy,” he said.

“I just want to talk,” Asami said as she shivered against the cold.

Tobirama frowned and reluctantly stepped aside so she could come in. She came in the house and unbuttoned her jacket, pursing her lips together. Tobirama kept his arms crossed and regarded her with a stern look on his face.

“So talk,” he said.

She actually rolled her eyes at him, “why are you so uptight? It’s just me.”

“Asami,” Tobirama warned.

“Fine,” Asami said with an annoyed huff. “I just wanted to come here and say that I’m sorry for blowing up like I did. Believe it or not, Naminé and I have actually come to a sort of understanding after…” Asami trailed off, making Tobirama narrow his eyes.

“After?”

She played with a lock of her dark hair, “nothing, just after one of our surgeries.”

He wasn’t convinced.

Asami’s icy eyes flashed across his face and her lips tugged downward, “wow. Even after all this time you still get that look on your face when it comes to her.”

Tobirama’s shoulders tensed as he could feel his glare intensify, “excuse me?”

“Nothing. I don’t want to talk about Naminé. I just wanted to let you know that I’m sorry,” Asami said. She took a step closer to him and reached a hand out to rest on the center of his chest. “You seem stressed.”

He clenched his jaw and stiffened at her touch, “I’m fine.”

“I’m sure you are,” she said. She took another step closer to him and Tobirama’s shoulders began to ache at how hard he was straining them. “But I could always help you relax if you needed.”

“Asami,” he said through his teeth.

“I know you’ve been avoiding me, but I could help,” she stepped closer and he could feel her breath on his face. Tobirama’s jaw locked hard enough to grind his teeth into dust.

He needed to put an end to this right now. If Asami couldn’t take a hint, then the best thing he could do was be as straight forward as possible.

“Asami, liste—”

He never got his words out because she shifted forward, curled her hand around the nape of his neck, and pressed her lips against his.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Posted early to distract myself from the pain of watching the birds (Eagles) lose. That fumble. That touchdown. Ripped my soul out and turned it into an effing horcrux.
> 
> Bear with the slow chapter. I make it up for it with the next one. Trusttttt


	14. Chapter 14

“What do you mean something’s wrong with my brakes? I thought my car was just leaking oil,” Naminé said from inside a cab on her way back to Tobirama’s. Toka offered to take her, but she said she wasn’t going to leave the office for a few more hours, and Naminé was just a little too tired to wait that long. So she opted for calling a cab instead.

“Listen, Doc. Someone cut your brake lines,” Ibiki said on the other line of the phone.

Naminé stared at the floor of the taxi and rubbed her forehead with her thumb. What the actual fuck?

“Are you kidding me?” She deadpanned.

“I don’t kid,” Ibiki said back. “We replaced the windshield, fixed the leak, but the brakes are another story.”

“Well can you have everything fixed by tomorrow night?” She asked.

“Oh that’s not a problem. I just figured you might want to know that someone is trying real hard to mess with you,” Ibiki replied.

Naminé let out a deep sigh as Tobirama’s house came into view, “trust me, they’re trying to do a whole lot more than just mess with me.”

“You want me to check for other shit then?” he asked.

Naminé pulled out her wallet, “I gotta go. But yeah, do whatever you have to. I don’t care. I’ll pay you whatever you want.”

“All right. I’ll get on that tomorrow,” Ibiki said right before she hung up.

She sighed and handed the cab driver money and got out of the car, taking immediate notice of the second vehicle in Tobirama’s driveway.

Naminé raised an eyebrow initially, but she didn’t think much of it. Maybe the car was Tsunade’s or Hashirama’s. And honestly, another person being around actually made her feel better as she walked up the dark driveway. It just made her feel less like there was a chance Hidan would jump out and slit her throat or something.

Naminé went to grab the spare key, but through the window of the front door she could see two figures inside, so she figured the door was unlocked and went inside.

The first thing she noticed was that the second figure wasn’t Hashirama or Tsunade or Mito or any other member of the Senju family. The second thing she noticed was that the person was standing _way_ too close to Tobirama, their hands cupping his face, and pulling back from him as if they were just caught in the middle of an intimate moment. And the third thing she noticed was that the person was _Asami_.

Naminé stared, her mouth suddenly feeling dryer than a goddamn desert.

“Sorry? I didn’t realize I was interrupting something?” Naminé muttered as her stomach fell to the floor. They had definitely been kissing, and the longer she looked at the two of them the more aware she became of the feeling of bile rising in her throat.

“You weren’t,” Tobirama said as he pinched the bridge of his nose, refusing to look at her.

“Oh yeah? Funny because it certainly looks like it,” she tried to make her voice sharp, as a way to wrap her sarcasm around herself like armor, but she couldn’t because she was all too aware of the way her throat cracked when she spoke.

“What the hell are you doing here?” Asami asked, taking half of a step back from Tobirama. She was far enough from him for them to appear less intimate, but close enough to make a point that they _had_ in fact been interrupted.

Fire blazed in Naminé’s chest and she desperately wished her car wasn’t at Ibiki’s, otherwise she would have turned right back around and left. Hell, she would have gone back to her condo alone if it meant not having to look at Asami so close to Tobirama.

“I’ve been staying here,” Naminé deadpanned, though her breath hitched when her brain fully registered what she had just seen.

They really had been in the middle of something…

Asami turned over her shoulder and turned an icy eye on Tobirama, but he still was pinching the bridge of his nose in frustration.

“Naminé, it’s not what you think,” Tobirama muttered, though he still wasn’t looking at her.

“Right,” Naminé whispered. _Fuck_ , why did it feel like she was going to cry? Why did she feel like she was about fall apart? She cleared her throat to try and get rid of the lump in it, but it didn’t help at all. She tried to reach for something to say, _anything_ to harden herself against what she had just seen, but she couldn’t do it. So she just just came back with a weak, “well don’t let me interrupt you two.”

She shouldered her way right passed Asami, her heart thumping loud enough to hear it in her ears.

“Naminé wait,” Tobirama called out.

She ignored him as she took in a sharp breath and hurried to the hall. And as soon as she was upstairs she barreled into the spare bathroom and slammed the door shut as hard as she could, resting her back against the door and staring up at the light.

Why was she so upset? Why did her chest feel like it was going to rip itself apart? Why _the fuck_ were her eyes so hot?

There was no discernible reason for her to feel the way she did.

If Tobirama wanted to mess around with Asami then that was his right. There was no reason for her to to be upset about that. Naminé gave up Tobirama nine years ago, so she had no reason to be hurting so much. It didn’t matter that she recently came to terms with how much she missed him or how badly she still wanted him in her life. The bottom line was that she had no real reason to be this upset.

She hated how her mind flashed back to last night and the way she told him that she missed him, and the way he held her, and the way he was softer with her than he had been since she came back.

None of that meant anything. It just meant that he maybe didn’t hate her as much as she tried to believe.

Tobirama could be with Asami. That was fine.

But that didn’t make it hurt any less.

* * *

“You need to leave,” Tobirama hissed as she put some much needed distance between himself and Asami.

“When were you going to tell me that Naminé was staying with you?” Asami demanded. Her blue eyes were livid and you know what? That was fine because Tobirama was pissed off too.

“I wasn’t because it’s none of your business,” Tobirama snapped. He couldn’t get that image of Naminé out of his head. He couldn’t stop thinking about her pupils blowing and the way the color drained from her face the minute she realized what she saw.

“Are you back with her?” Asami pressed. “She _left_ you, Tobirama. She walked away from you without a reason—”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Tobirama hissed. He couldn’t explain why he suddenly felt so intensely protective of Naminé, but he did.

“So you _are_ with her then,” she murmured.

“I don’t know what we are,” Tobirama said before he could even register his words. He didn’t know what was wrong with him and why he was being like this. The only thing he knew was that after his conversation with Naminé at the hospital, that he felt some type of way about her. He didn’t know what exactly that was, but he did know that there was a horrible ache in his chest when he thought about how upset she was, and that all he wanted to do was explain himself to her as soon as possible.

“You didn’t even tell her about us.”

“There _is_ no us, Asami,” Tobirama said firmly.

“You can’t be serious,” she muttered.

“Yes, I’m serious.” He was starting to get really mad, and he couldn’t do that. He couldn’t blow up on Asami because she just couldn’t take the brute force of his anger. She had never been able to, and he didn’t blame her. He knew he could be downright harsh when he lost his temper, but having to restrain himself from going off was only pissing him off even more. At least when he lost his temper with Naminé, she could take it. Sure, she’d come back at him with biting sarcasm, but at least she could deal with him when he got like that.

“So we’ve been what? Just fuck buddies the last two years?” Asami asked. She must have been angrier than she let on, because Asami absolutely loathed profanity.

He locked his jaw as he mulled over what she said. He hated how exact her words were, because Tobirama didn’t think himself to be that type of man. He was someone who would have rather completely abstained from sex rather than have a “fuck buddy”. But he couldn’t deny the fact that he had in fact been sleeping with Asami on and off for the last two years. And he hated himself a little more when he acknowledged that he had only been sleeping with her because he was lonely, and because Asami was familiar and safe. But it was the truth. Even if he detested it. Even if Asami deserved better.

He felt dirty and guilty, but he couldn’t refute her words because he never saw Asami as anything other than a friend. That was the whole reason why he stopped answering her calls a few months ago. He wanted to stop sneaking around with her because it wasn’t right. He just never directly told her because he knew she would have acted like this.

He may have felt horrible, but he wouldn’t lie to her.

“I think you should leave,” he said, trying as hard as possible to be at least somewhat gentle with his words.

Asami puckered her lips again in a pout and shook her head. Then she said a tight, “you two deserve each other.”

Without another word, she stepped out of the house and yanked the door shut behind her.

Tobirama groaned and rubbed his eyes. He knew he was out of line. He knew he was wrong.

Guilt coiled in his gut but he couldn’t revel in it for long, because he had another woman he had to deal with upstairs.

And the woman upstairs was going to be a hell of a lot harsher than Asami and fifty times harder to pacify.

He was more like his father than he cared to admit, because from what Tobirama could remember of his mother, she had been exceptionally difficult as well.

Tobirama’s steps were heavy as he took the stairs two at a time and walked right up to the spare bathroom where the door was shut.

He sighed and rested his hands on either side of the doorframe and hung his head between his shoulders.

“Naminé, come out of there and talk to me.”

He expected a sharp _‘no’_ or even a snide _‘make me’_ , but he didn’t get either.

He didn’t get either because the door opened and Naminé was standing there, arms crossed over her chest and glaring hard enough to burn a hole through his head.

“As soon as my car is fixed I’ll take my stuff and leave,” she said in a low voice.

Tobirama frowned, “did I say you had to leave?”

“Didn’t have to,” she said back. She turned away from him and grabbed her phone that was on the sink and put it in her back pocket.

“Are you going somewhere?” He muttered, purposely not moving from where he leaned against the doorframe and where his arms blocked her way out of the bathroom.

“I texted Madara. When I hear back I’m gonna ask him to pick me up so you and Asami can have some privacy.”

Tobirama’s jaw locked hard enough to give him a headache. Hands down, the worst part of that was that her words were empty of any sarcasm, and that she was talking to him in a perfectly calm and reasonable tone.

He almost _wanted_ to hear her biting sarcasm. At least that way he would know Naminé was just full of shit and upset with him. This calm Naminé? He didn’t know how to deal with her. Naminé just didn’t do calm.

“Madara,” he deadpanned.

“Mhm.”

He glared and stood up straight to block her when she tried to sidestep her way around him, “I told Asami to leave.”

“That’s too bad,” she said in that same composed voice. She tried to walk by him again but he blocked her with ease. She glowered and pursed her lips. “You’ve been so stressed. I’m sure she could help you _relax_.”

There it was.

Her façade was starting to crack because the sarcasm was already sneaking its way back into her voice.

“I’m sure she could,” he said, waiting for her to come back at him with a snappy reply, almost egging her on.

She didn’t disappoint.

“Well then I’m sure Madara will be able to help me relax,” she took her time with her words, over enunciating every single syllable until he could feel his blood pressure beginning to rise at what she was insinuating.

“Excuse me?” He hissed.

“Sorry, is that a problem?”

“Listen to yourself,” he said. “You don’t even know what you saw and now you’re talking about running to Madara?”

Naminé scoffed, “I know what I saw.”

She went to shove her way around him, but Tobirama had enough and caught her by her hips and held her in place, “Naminé, enough.”

Her honey topaz eyes met his, and that’s when he saw it.

She was upset. _Genuinely_ upset.

“Let go of me,” her voice was so weak when she said it that it made his stomach churn. “I don’t care what you do with Asami.”

That sarcasm was gone again and she broke his gaze to look at the floor, struggling to get away from him. He let out another sigh and removed his hands from her hips, waiting for the moment she stormed passed him. But she didn’t. She just put her arms around herself as her eyebrows knitted together.

“I’m not doing anything with Asami,” he told her.

She pushed her blonde hair out of her face and squeezed her eyes shut for a brief moment, and then they snapped open and she was glaring at him again.

“Well it’s none of my business anyway. So I’ll just go stay with Madara.”

Tobirama couldn’t help it when he glared back at her, “my relationship with Asami is nothing for you to get this upset about.”

Naminé’s eyes widened, “so there _is_ a relationship then?”

“What?” Tobirama groaned and rubbed his eyes. “ _No_ , not like that. We’re not anything anymore.”

Naminé actually laughed, but it was a sharp sound that only made the ache in his chest worse, “ _anymore_.”

He looked at her long and hard, debating on what to say.

He wouldn’t be dishonest and tell her that nothing ever happened. He could have told her that he didn’t feel any particular way about Asami other than her being a friend, but Naminé had seen Asami kiss him, so she wasn't likely to believe him. And he wasn’t one to lie just to spare her feelings.

“Don’t push this if you can’t handle the truth. I’m telling you there’s nothing going on anymore,” he said.

“Doesn’t matter,” Naminé said, her voice hoarse and strained. “If you want to hook up with Asami, then that’s none of my business.”

He glared and crossed his arms, “I told you not to push this.”

“I’m not pushing anything,” she said in that same broken voice that made him realize she really wasn’t. She really wasn’t going to fight him on this.

This time when she shouldered around him, he let her go. He stood in the doorway and scratched the back of his head in frustration. Why was he letting Naminé get to him like this? Why was he so determined to pull her aside and make her see that he wasn’t romantically involved with Asami?

Why did he even care?

But Tobirama just couldn’t let it go.

He turned around and followed her into the hall, stopping her by wrapping a hand around her arm, “Naminé, wait.”

She whipped around and yanked her arm away from him, “I’m not going to fight with you about this.”

His stomach hurt. Why wouldn’t she just _listen_?

“You’re being ridiculous,” Tobirama hissed.

“How?” Naminé snapped. “I’m trying to walk away from an argument. I meant it when I said I didn’t want to fight with you anymore. Whatever you and Asami do together is your business and only your business.”

Tobirama groaned, “Naminé, enough.”

“Just drop it!” She snarled.

“ _What do you want from me?_ ” He shouted when it all became too much. He just couldn’t _take it_ any longer and he certainly couldn’t drop it. She wouldn’t even give him a chance. She wouldn’t even _look_ at him for Christ’s sake. “Did you want me to remain celibate for the rest of my life?”

“Of course not!” Naminé snapped back.

“Then I don’t see the problem,” Tobirama said, not even finding the strength to cross his arms as he was too busy with trying to refrain from yelling again.

“Why are you trying to fight with me?” Naminé demanded. “Just leave it alone! You win, Tobirama!”

He just stared at her, almost in disbelief. God, what the hell was wrong with him? Why couldn’t he just drop this already? Normally, Naminé was the one who pushed and pushed until they fought, and he was the one who tried to walk away.

But he _couldn’t_.

“I just want you to listen,” he said with his voice low and strained.

“What do you want me to listen to?” Naminé asked, her eyes wide and angry and sad all at once. “You think I want to listen to you tell me about how you and Asami have been screwing? I’m sorry, but I don’t want to hear it. That would be like me asking you to listen to me tell you how I’ve been screwing Madara!”

He gave her the harshest glare he could muster, “that’s not the same thing.”

She laughed again, “how?”

“You know how I feel about Madara,” his hissed.

“And you know how I feel about Asami!” She shouted, pointing her finger into his chest as she lost her own composure.

“There’s nothing going on with me and Asami!” He shouted back.

“So you haven’t been fucking her then?” Naminé yelled, her face flushed in anger.

Tobirama scoffed hard, “why does that matter? I told you there’s nothing going on anymore.”

“You don’t get it!” Her eyes were livid. “I don’t care that you’ve been messing around with someone! That’s not the point! It’s been _nine years_ , of course I expected you to be with someone. What I don’t get is why it had to be Asami of all people!”

Tobirama gripped her shoulders and pulled her close, forcing her to hold his gaze that he knew was too intense for his own good.

“I started messing around with Asami because I was stressed and lonely and she was there. She was always there, all right?”

“Get off of me,” she said quietly as she planted her hands on his chest and pushed him away from her. “I don’t care who you fuck, Tobirama.”

“Clearly you do,” he deadpanned.

He should have backed off. He should have let her fume and walk away to cool off. He should have left her alone.

He just couldn’t.

“No,” she started, holding his eyes with her own. “I don’t. I care that you fucked Asami for the same reason that you would care if I fucked Madara.”

Just the _thought_ of Naminé with Madara made him want to punch another pillar and split his knuckles wide open again.

“Madara has always wanted to sleep with you,” he said under his breath as he tried to stop the shaking in his fists.

“And Asami has always wanted to sleep with you!” Naminé argued as she threw her hands up in the air.

He clenched his jaw, “me having sex with Asami once in a blue moon is _nothing_ compared to you getting into bed with Madara.” God, just the thought of Madara with his hands all over her was nauseating and it made him feel like there was fire flooding his veins.

Naminé scoffed and shook her head.

“Do you have any idea how it feels for me to stand here with the knowledge that you had sex with _Asami_? Because now I can’t get that horrible image of her with her hands all over you out of my head and I can’t stop thinking about the fact that you _wanted_ her and that you—” her voice hitched and she groaned and rubbed her eyes.

Tobirama closed his own eyes. He could hear the pain in her voice and he didn’t want to look at her with tears in her eyes.

“I’m going to call Madara and stay with him for a while.”

His eyes snapped open, “you would really sleep with Madara just to spite me?”

“What?” Naminé whispered, her angry eyes rimmed red. “No, that wasn’t what I was planning on doing. I was planning on calling him and staying with him until the shit with Hidan was put to rest. But you know what? Maybe I should if that’s how low you think I am.”

He could feel his upper lip begin to curl into a snarl, “I don’t—”

“ _What?_ You don’t what? You don’t want to think about Madara with his hands all over me? You don’t want to think about how he’ll touch me? Is that it? You don’t want to think about me moaning Madara’s name—”

“STOP,” he shouted as he slammed his hand against the wall hard enough to shake the entire hallway. He couldn’t help it. He _couldn’t_ think about that. It made him want to beat Madara to death. It made him want to strangle the man. It made him want to submerge himself underwater until every last ounce of oxygen was burned from his lungs.

She looked at him and shook her head with a scoff.

“You’re unbelievable. You can do it to me, but I can’t do it to you,” she muttered.

“I didn’t have sex with Asami to spite you,” he said through his teeth. _Fuck_ , he was so _angry_. The thought of Naminé being with _anyone_ else was enough to make his chest feel so tight that he couldn’t breathe. But the thought of her with Madara? No. He couldn’t. He wouldn’t think about that.

“And I haven’t had sex with Madara to spite you,” she said back in that composed tone from earlier that lacked any and all sarcasm. She turned around to walk away from him again but he stood there seething, and before he knew it, he was pressing the issue again.

“That’s it then?” Tobirama pushed.

He should have dropped the issue. For fuck’s sake, why the hell didn’t he just drop it? Why was he going after this? Why was he so determined to try and make Naminé see that his physical relationship with Asami was nothing?

“What the hell, Tobirama?” She demanded, turning back around and stepping well into his personal bubble and jabbing her finger into his chest for a second time. “What do you want me to say?”

He didn’t know. He didn’t even know why he was pushing this as much as he was.

So he remained silent and Naminé huffed.

“That Madara comment really upset you, didn’t it?” She asked, her eyes flickering all across his face and looking for some sort of indication. He was careful to keep his expression even as she did and he only locked his jaw in response.

She frowned and softened her voice, “if I really wanted to hurt you I would do it, you know. I would pick up the phone and call him and let him have me.” He clenched his jaw so hard that he had half the mind to worry he was going to chip a tooth. “I could do it too. It would be easy.”

“Well then?” It hurt how strained his voice was. It hurt how much her words affected him.

Naminé’s frown intensified and she whispered, “you really think I would do something like that?”

He worked his jaw and kept quiet as she stood directly in front of him, close enough for him to smell the lavender of her shampoo.

She laughed in spite of herself and brought both of her hands up to cradle his face, her thumb running soothingly across his cheek bone.

He hated how much he could feel himself relax at her touch.

“Tobirama Senju, don’t you know me at all?” She murmured.

He inhaled sharply, refusing to look away from her honey topaz irises and kept his jaw almost wired shut.

“Why would I ever sleep with Madara Uchiha when the only man I have ever wanted in my entire life is standing right in front of me?”

Her words were so goddamn soft and quiet and helpless. There was no sarcasm. No resigned sadness. No thinly veiled anger.

They were just so gentle that they washed away the last of his frustration and left him speechless. The fact that after all this time she was still able to rile him up so easily and soothe his anger with a few soft touches and tender words left him feeling so goddamn nostalgic and vulnerable.

And in that moment, with her still cradling his face and looking at him so intently, he didn’t care about any of it anymore. All he cared about was the fact that she was _here_ , and _safe_ , and that she still wanted _him_ and didn’t want Madara.

He just didn’t fucking care anymore.

His hands moved of their own accord, one going to the small of her back and pulling her closer and the other going to the back of her head.

Naminé’s eyes widened for a fraction of a second before they flickered to his lips, and then flashed back up to his eyes.

Tobirama didn’t waste another second with so much as a passing thought, and he brought her closer, pulling her body flush against his and kissing her before he got ahold of his common sense again.

Naminé reacted instantly, snaking her arms around his neck and knotting her fingers in his hair that needed to be cut as she kissed him back _hard_.

His lips moved against hers with a pace that was fast and desperate, one that she easily kept up with. She tugged on his hair and his teeth grazed her bottom lip when he could feel her shiver in his arms.

He wanted her like he had never wanted anyone before. He wanted her the way he did when they were teenagers and awkwardly fumbled with each other’s clothing for the first time in a nervous frenzy for fear of being caught by one of his brothers.

Only there was no reason for them to rush now, but they still did because the time apart from each other had been like a rock in his stomach and he just wanted ease that tension and be with her again.

Naminé, generally always being the one the to make the first move, twisted her fingers in the bottom of his shirt and pulled it up over his head.

He pinned her against the wall and kissed her deep enough to make her whimper against his lips as her hands roamed across his chest.

He broke the kiss when he went to pull her own shirt off, but suddenly her hands were on his wrists, clamping down hard.

Tobirama’s eyes flashed to hers in confusion and he breathed out a hoarse, “what is it?”

“I don’t want you to see,” she whispered as her eyes fell toward the floor.

Didn’t want him to see what? He couldn’t even count how many times he had seen Naminé naked before in his life. What was there that she didn’t want him to see?

“I don’t follow,” he muttered as he still pinned her against the wall and stood chest to chest with her.

She sighed and squeezed her eyes shut for a moment and then looked back at him as she cradled his face and kissed the corner of his mouth.

“The scars,” she admitted.

He pulled back just enough to get a clearer look at her. He could see the hesitance in her expression and he narrowed his eyes.

“Hidan,” he muttered.

She nodded and dipped her head to press a soft kiss to the base of his throat and make him feel hot all over.

Tobirama wasn’t sure if he wanted to see the scars either. He knew seeing the marks that sick fuck left on her was going to make him livid beyond belief, but he wanted to see _her_. His memory had faded over the years, and that had been fine with him because he didn’t want to keep thinking about Naminé after she had left, but if they were going to go any further then he wanted to see her.

He needed to.

“Naminé,” he murmured, his thumb and index finger holding her chin to bring her face to face with him. He leaned forward and kissed her, feeling that same searing heat that crackled between them just moments ago.

She kissed him deeply, flicking her tongue across his lower lip and sending heat straight to his lower stomach, and then mumbled against his lips, "...all right."

With her permission, he lifted her shirt over her head and caressed her sides, kissing her neck and pulling back to take in the sight of her.

He wasn’t sure what he had been expecting when she said she had scars, but _this_ definitely was not it.

There were deep warping scars that swooped from her ribs all the way down to her lower stomach, crossing over each other, both discoloring and disfiguring the skin they touched and standing out so that they were the only things he could focus on.

It felt like someone lit a fire underneath him because he was suddenly hot all over, absolutely furious beyond all rhyme or reason when he saw those awful scars.

“Tobirama,” she said, cradling his face to soothe his mounting temper.

“I should have killed him,” he hissed.

He could feel that same hatred in him that he felt the moment he took her to her condo after Hidan initially broke in. He could feel that same disgust he felt when Hidan showed up at the hospital and tried to grab her by her ponytail.

He should have fucking put him in a body bag right then and there, trial be damned.

“Stop,” she whispered. She brought her arms around his neck and kissed him on the mouth to distract him from those thoughts.

If he had been kissing any other woman it wouldn’t have worked. He would have ruined the moment with his horrible temper, but Naminé wasn’t any other woman. She was Naminé, and she could have talked him off a cliff with nothing more than a soft voice and a kiss.

So he temporarily abandoned his anger, promising himself to revisit it later, and kissed her back so deeply that she actually moaned and raked her nails down his back.

The sound of her moaning went straight to his stomach and he forcefully pressed her up against the wall to unbutton her jeans and yank them off of her, just downright desperate to get her into his bed.

She had to have felt the same way because she tightened her arms around his neck and jumped up so her legs wrapped around his hips.

He held her up easily, walking down the hall to his room and collapsed onto his bed with her beneath him.

She wasted no time in getting him out of the rest of his clothes so he was completely exposed to her.

Naminé’s eyes shamelessly raked over his exposed body and she sighed and leaned up to press soft kisses against his neck.

He grunted as her lips moved against him, a little impressed that she was able to remember all the spots that drove him crazy, and moved his hands behind her back to unhook her bra and then to pull down her underwear until she was completely naked beneath him.

His room was dark, with the only light coming from the moon and the light that spilled in from the hallway, but it was enough for him to see all of her, and he couldn’t help it when his hands were on her in an instant as he caressed her inner thighs, her sides, and her chest.

He didn’t think he had ever been so turned on before in his life than in that moment with Naminé lying beneath him, completely exposed, after being separated from each other for almost a godforsaken _decade_.

“Shit,” he breathed out when he rested in the cradle of her thighs and hovered over her. He kissed his way down her neck, sucking and biting along the way until she was a gasping, shivering mess beneath him.

“Tobirama,” she groaned when he kissed and sucked at the sensitive spot low on her collarbone.

He knew he was being reckless, because there was no way in hell he wasn’t leaving marks all over her body, but he couldn’t find it in him to care.

It had been too long since he was with her to even remotely give a shit.

He jolted when her fingers wrapped around him and grunted, going back up to kiss her on the lips and tugging her lower lip between her teeth.

He dragged his hand down the entirety of her body and rubbed the soft heat between her legs, eliciting a low moan out of her that made him feel even hotter than he thought possible.

If he thought she wanted him before, then touching her and playing her body like an instrument only cemented those thoughts even more, because he could feel that she absolutely wanted him as badly as he wanted her.

Under different circumstances he would have taken his time with her, making her beg for him until he decided to take her. But this particular instance was too much for him to do that.

He wanted her so badly that his entire body ached. He wanted to show her that he didn’t have feelings for Asami and that she had absolutely no goddamn reason to go to Madara for a single thing.

Because in that moment, Naminé was _his_.

Her pupils were blown when she pulled back to look at him, and he couldn’t wait any longer, so he pushed into her slower than he thought imaginable and sucked in a harsh breath when he was completely inside her.

 _Fuck_ , she was so tight that he didn’t think he would be able last long at all. The sensation of her around him and the fact that he hadn’t been with her in nine horribly fucking long years was just too much. It had to be quick even though he wanted to take his time because everything combined together was a heavy weight on him that made every single sensation feel nothing short of completely mind blowing.

“ _God_ ,” she groaned when he grinded into her with a maddeningly slow pace. He rocked his hips gradually at first, letting her adjust. But when her back arched up off the bed when he grinded into her _hard_ , any self control he thought he had slipped away because it just felt too good to hold onto.

He braced one hand on the headboard, all other senses falling away as he picked up the pace to fuck her faster.

She moaned and raked her nails down his chest, legs tightening around his hips.

It was like he was in a trance, his eyes so incredibly focused on where she writhed beneath him with half lidded eyes and lips parted as tiny breaths and moans escaped her.

This was really happening. It was really Naminé beneath him. It was really Naminé who had her legs wrapped like iron around his hips as he fucked her hard enough to make the both of them see stars.

“ _Tobirama_ ,” she moaned, her hands gripping tightly onto his shoulders.

Hearing his name on her lips did something to him, because he grunted and pushed himself up, gripping her hips hard enough to leave bruises and roughly pulled her into him as he thrusted his own hips forward to grind into her hard and deep.

Her eyes squeezed shut and her mouth fell open to let out a low, dirty moan, one that went straight to the heat in his lower abdomen and made him fuck her that much deeper and that much harder, fanning the flames of his own desperate lust.

Tobirama knew he was being too rough. He knew he was going to leave her sore and with marks all over her body the next day, but he just didn’t have it in him to care.

 _Nine years_.

Nine miserable fucking years without her.

She chased him her whole life, had the nerve to make him fall stupidly in love with her, had the audacity to agree to marry him, and then fucking _left_ him.

She had to leave. He had made peace with that years ago. But for fuck’s sake, she couldn’t have come back after she had gotten help? She couldn’t have come back sooner and apologized so they could have moved forward?

Why the fuck did she have to be away for so goddamn _long_?

He shook the thought from his head when his eyes devoured her body, starting with the look of undisguised lust on her face, then going down to admire the soft skin of her neck, down the swell of her breasts, the slope of her waist, and the curve of her hips.

She had those awful scars on her stomach and thighs, and looking at them made his chest hurt, so he had to look back at her face, where her eyes were still half lidded, but now focused on his body and his eyes.

There was no way in hell he was going to be able to last much longer, not with how hard and fast he was going, and all he knew was that he wanted to be closer to her when he finished. So he leaned forward and rested his weight on one elbow while he kept one hand on her hip, squeezing way too hard and probably leaving a bruise.

She must have wanted him closer too, because her arms wrapped around his neck without a moment’s hesitation and she gave him a lazy, open-mouthed kiss, eliciting a low groan from him that she swallowed.

He canted his hips upward, at a slightly different angle, and just barely smirked when she gasped and squeezed her legs impossibly tight around him.

“ _Yes_ ,” she moaned. “ _Right there_.”

He brought his hand that was bruising her hips up to caress her chest and her breathing only became more labored, making obvious to him that she wasn’t far from coming.

“ _Tobirama_ ,” she whimpered as she pulled on his hair.

His chest swelled with pride at the fact that after all this time he could still get her to moan his name so easily and that he could still bring her to the edge so quickly.

He dipped his head forward to kiss the tender spot just below her jaw, teeth grazing the sensitive skin there and thrusted into her hard enough to make her moan his name again.

“ _Tobirama, I-I_ …” her words became a muddled mess and he pulled back, wanting to look at her when she finished for him.

He fucked her deeper as the heat only continued to rise in him, and he looked down at her, catching the exact moment she reached her climax.

The look of her head falling back into the pillows as her back arched upwards, and the feeling of her tightening impossibly around him as she shivered, brought him to his own climax. He grunted and thrusted into her once, twice, three more times as he tipped over the edge and his vision became obstructed by stars.

He collapsed onto his elbows and groaned, burying his face in the crook of her neck and riding out a pleasure that was too goddamn good to deny.

He panted as he came down from his high and pulled his head back to risk a look at her, almost fearing what came next.

Naminé’s eyes were clear of lust, but they were filled with an emotion he either couldn’t decipher, or wasn’t ready to decipher.

She held his face in her hands and ran her thumb across his cheek bone, locking eyes with him.

“C’mere,” she whispered so softly that he almost didn’t hear it.

He couldn’t even fight against it because she was gently pulling him to her, and her lips were on his as she kissed him slowly, like she had all the time in the world.

Tobirama sighed into the kiss and didn’t even care when his body reacted on its own, one hand caressing her face and kissing her back deeply, molding his mouth against hers and making both of their heads spin.

He didn’t think a kiss had ever left his senses so heightened before, because every place where her fingers grazed his skin felt like a trail of fire, and he swore he could feel her heartbeat against his chest.

He could have kissed her deeply and passionately like that all goddamn night. He could have let the kiss go on until he had enough energy to take her a second time. But eventually they had to stop because neither of them could breathe, so they had to break the intimate kiss to gasp for air.

He let out another long exhale and moved over to lie down on his side, not sure if he wanted to acknowledge what just happened between them or not.

Naminé rolled onto her side so she looked at him and was close enough that if he wanted to kiss her again he could.

“Do you want me to leave?” she whispered.

He looked at her long and hard before he answered with a quiet, “no.”

Because you know what? He didn’t want her to leave. He had enough of Naminé Nakano fucking leaving him.

He was sick of it, even if he wouldn’t admit it out loud.

A small smile graced her features, “good, because I didn’t want to.”

He could have laughed because the look on her face mixed with the words were just so painfully _her_.

“You’re insufferable,” he muttered half-heartedly, exhaustion creeping through his body from just moments ago when he took her.

She laughed softly so he didn’t have to, and his heart felt light for the first time since she came back.

The feeling of her beside him made Tobirama relax more than he thought possible, and he could feel his eyelids begin to droop as the exhaustion became harder to fight off.

Then once they were shut all the way, he could feel Naminé move closer and press a kiss as light as feather over both of his eyes, and Tobirama’s chest tightened as he remembered a time when she would kiss him like that whenever they fell asleep together.

Afterwards he felt her shift in the bed and being too tired to actually think better of it, he brought an arm around her and pulled her back against his chest.

Then he fell into a peaceful sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YA'LL I cannot believe my lil Catholic self wrote this sin LOL OMG 
> 
> Miiiight be a little over a week until the next update since I'm swamped with research I need to do for my conference paper, but we'll see.
> 
> Drop a comment if you liked this please and thank you!


	15. Chapter 15

“Naminé,” Tobirama muttered, his voice thick with sleep. “Get up.”

Naminé shifted in the bed, all too aware of Tobirama’s arm that was thrown across her waist, and breathed in deeply as she buried her face in a pillow.

“Naminé,” Tobirama said again.

“I’m up,” she groaned as sleep tried to claim her again. She was just too comfortable to try and fight it. The bed was soft, and she was so warm with Tobirama’s arm around her and his bare chest against her back. She could have spent the whole day sleeping like that.

She heard Tobirama let out an exasperated huff, and then before she knew it, she was assaulted with cold air.

Naminé jerked up and her eyes snapped open to see that Tobirama had pulled the blankets off of her.

“Your alarm’s been going off,” Tobirama murmured as he shifted so he was now lying on his stomach with his arms folded above his head. Naminé rubbed her eyes and sure enough, she could hear the faint sound of her phone’s alarm ringing.

Naminé huffed and got out of the bed, pausing only to take a second to let her eyes linger on Tobirama’s relaxed figure, and smiled to herself.

“Do you need me to drive you?” Tobirama asked even though his voice was muffled by the pillow.

“No,” Naminé said easily as she crossed her arms and padded over to the door. She didn’t have any clothes on and the chill in the air made her skin ripple with gooseflesh. “Kurenai’s driving me.”

She heard a soft “mm” in response, and Naminé took that as her cue to step out of the room and close the door behind her.

She picked up her discarded clothes that were strewn across the hallway floor, and grabbed her phone out of the pocket of her jeans to silence the alarm. She wasn’t terribly late, only about ten minutes (thank God for Tobirama’s light sleeping), so she still had time to take a quick shower and get her things together.

She went into the bathroom, and as soon as Naminé stepped into the hot shower, she became aware of the dull aches all over her body. She sighed and ran her fingers through her hair as she worked the shampoo through it and tried not to think too hard about last night. Otherwise she would get way too distracted and waste valuable time before she had to meet Kurenai outside.

That was easier said than done though, because even as she went about her typical routine of towel drying her hair and putting on very light makeup, she kept thinking about what the hell happened between her and Tobirama.

They’d have to talk about it at some point, and Naminé really had no idea how to approach that conversation because she was guaranteed to get emotional and then she’d probably say something stupid to him that was crossing a line.

Then again, wasn’t sex in itself crossing a line?

Naminé looked down at her phone to see a text from Kurenai letting her know that she was there, and Naminé hurried with shoving a few things into her workbag, going downstairs, and grabbing a jacket before she went outside.

She ran her fingers through her damp hair in an attempt to make it dry faster as she climbed into Kurenai’s car and gave the nurse a quick smile.

“Hey,” Naminé said. She looked back at her phone to see a couple of unread texts from Madara last night, and she pursed her lips as she opened them.

She texted him last night when she was a goddamn mess about the Asami thing, and asked what he was up to. She really did intend on asking him if she could crash at his place for a few days since she was so upset at the time, but then Tobirama came upstairs and one thing led to another and… Yeah…

**_‘At the club. Why?’_ **

**_‘You good?’_ **

**_‘This is Tobirama related isn’t it?’_ **

“Oversleep?” Kurenai asked.

Naminé typed back a response to Madara saying that she was sorry for the random text and that it was in fact Tobirama related but everything was fine. She then dropped her phone in her workbag and looked at Kurenai.

“What makes you say that?”

“You just look a little flustered,” Kurenai said. “How was your super secret attorney visit?”

Naminé smirked at the woman, “it was super secret.”

Kurenai actually laughed, “you’re a piece of work.”

“So you’ve said,” Naminé said with a grin.

“You’re in an awfully good mood, Doc. What happened? Did your attorney give you millions of dollars or something?” Kurenai asked, her eyes flickering over to Naminé for a brief second before she looked back at the road.

“I’m not in a good mood,” Naminé said as her eyebrows began to knit together.

“You kidding me? You’re practically beaming. What’s going on?” Kurenai shot a look at her and smirked mischievously, “did you have crazy hot sex? Is that why you’re in an abnormally pleasant mood?”

Naminé must have choked on her own spit, because she swallowed and then immediately started coughing and gasping for breath.

Kurenai lost it and erupted into a fit of giggles, “holy shit you did!”

“Kurenai!” Naminé shrieked when she got her coughing under control and when she could feel her face already flushing.

“Who’d you hook up with? Your attorney or Tobirama?” Kurenai pressed through her hysteric laughter, reaching out and to lightly smack Naminé on her arm a few times

Naminé scowled and gently pushed Kurenai’s hands away from her, “my attorney is a woman.”

“Oh so you slept with Tobirama then,” Kurenai remarked. And damn, if Naminé couldn’t just _hear_ the smug grin in her voice.

“Kurenai, stop!” Naminé insisted. She felt the need to cover her face because holy shit she could not stop blushing for the life of her.

They reached a red light and Kurenai took full advantage of the stopped car to inspect Naminé’s face as thoroughly as possible.

“Wait, you actually did?” Kurenai asked, her eyes doubling in size. “I was just messing around but you totally did, didn’t you?”

Naminé hated just how easily Kurenai could read her, because there she was, sitting the passenger’s seat on her way to work being questioned about her impulsive decisions with no way out of the conversation.

“I actually hate you,” Naminé groaned as she rubbed her temples and directed her attention to her window.

Kurenai covered her mouth in a poor attempted to stifle her laughter, and after a few long moments of that, she said a quick, “well damn. How was it?”

Naminé banged her head against the passenger’s seat in frustration. She wasn’t actually mad at Kurenai or anything, but she did feel like she was back in high school again, having a very similar conversation with Toka at the age of sixteen.

“Can we change the subject?” Naminé tried.

“Hell no. This is karma for all those times you asked me about Asuma,” Kurenai remarked. For whatever reason, she wasn’t at all bothered by Naminé’s attitude about the whole thing, and Naminé wasn’t sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing.

“You don’t care about my dignity, do you?” Naminé asked as she gathered enough courage to look at Kurenai.

“No, not really,” Kurenai said easily.

 Naminé shook her head and sighed, “unbelievable.”

“Okay here,” Kurenai briefly shot Naminé a smirk before she focused on the road again as the hospital came into view. “You want to talk about not having any dignity? Me and Asuma were hooking up one night when he was on call, and in the middle of everything he got a page and had to leave. Literally. In the middle of sex. He had to leave. In the _middle_ of it.”

Naminé smirked and held in a laugh, “that’s happened to me more times than I care to admit.”

“It sucked!” Kurenai’s eyes flickered and she laughed, “so there goes my dignity. Your turn. How was it?”

Naminé pursed her lips and then let out a chuckle, “it was good.”

“Yeah?” Kurenai pressed.

“Really good,” Naminé said, a smile beginning to tug at the corner of her lips.

“That’s all I get? Two words?” Kurenai began to grin.

Naminé couldn’t help it when she snickered, “well what more do you want?”

“I don’t know!” Kurenai said with a laugh as they approached the hospital and began to pull into the parking lot. “How good was it? Were things awkward after? Do you think it’s gonna happen again? Give me something other than two words!”

“Okay um,” Naminé rolled her eyes affectionately. She definitely felt like she was in high school again. “Like I said, it was _really_ good. Honestly, I’m still a little sore.” She heard a sound that was a cross between a squeal and a cackle from Kurenai but Naminé continued. “No, nothing was awkward after, surprisingly enough. But Tobirama doesn’t really do awkward. He just kinda glares if he’s ever uncomfortable. And no, I don’t think anything is going to happen again until we talk because he’s not the kind of person to let something like that sit. So yeah. There you go.”

Kurenai pulled into a parking spot and the two of them got out of the car and walked through the doors of the hospital to head for the locker room to change into their scrubs.

“Well damn,” Kurenai said. “Do you want it to happen again?”

Naminé tried to feign nonchalance, “well I’m not gonna pass up amazing sex if that’s what you mean.”

Kurenai chuckled, “I get that. But something tells me it’s not just the sex you want, but him.”

Naminé fiddled with the sleeves of her jacket as they got closer to the locker room and looked at Kurenai quickly, “when you say things like that it sounds like you’ve known me my entire life.”

“So I’m right,” Kurenai said.

Naminé swallowed hard and almost couldn’t believe her ears when she said, “well you’re not wrong.”

Kurenai’s smile shifted from smug to sympathetic.

“Does he know that?” She asked, her voice casual as they walked into the locker room and went through the morning routine of changing before their shifts.

“I’m not sure,” Naminé admitted. “I’ll have to tell him eventually though, won’t I?”

“I’d say so,” Kurenai said back.

Naminé was quiet after that as she dug through her workbag, looking for a thermal undershirt to wear beneath her scrub top, but came up empty handed. She must have forgotten to grab one since she was so distracted before she met up with Kurenai.

She sighed and peeled her shirt off to swap it for her scrub top and did the same with her pants. Then she slipped her white coat on and closed her locker, turning back around to wait for Kurenai so they could walk up to the floor together.

“You’re with me today, right?” Naminé asked.

Kurenai pulled her hair back into a ponytail as her eyes flickered to her, “yeah. I’m with you and Kagami.”

“Oh awesome. So then—”

“Is that a hickey?” Kurenai asked in disbelief. She walked right up to Naminé as her eyes focused on a spot on Naminé’s chest that was only visible because of the v-neck in the scrub top and because she lacked an undershirt.

Naminé’s eyes widened, “ _what?_ ”

She pulled her phone out of her pocket to open the camera so she could see herself, and her mouth fell open when she could see a small bruise on her chest, just along her collarbone.

Kurenai was laughing so hard that she was almost near tears and Naminé immediately put her hand to her chest to hide the mark.

“Please tell me you have some concealer,” Naminé hissed.

Kurenai shook her head, “I don’t. Plus, it would be too light for you.”

“Of course,” Naminé groaned.

Before Kurenai could tease her anymore, the door of the locker room opened and Naminé’s eyes flashed to where Asami was walking in.

Her stomach tightened and Asami looked at her for only a fraction of a second before she went right to her locker without a single word.

There were things that Naminé wanted to ask Asami, but at the same time there weren’t. She wanted to know more about what the hell she had been doing with Tobirama, but Naminé didn’t think she wanted to talk to Asami specifically about that. She’d rather just sit down with Tobirama and have a level headed conversation about it because he wouldn’t lie, despite how much the truth might hurt.

So Naminé looked away from Asami and left the locker room with Kurenai.

“One day I want the Asami story from your perspective,” Kurenai said. They headed up to the surgical floor and Naminé let out a sigh.

“I promise that one day I’ll tell you everything.”

Kurenai looked like she was going to say something, but she stopped when Kagami briskly walked right up to them and grabbed Naminé’s shoulders and beamed at her.

“Uh hi Dr. Uch—”

“I got the fellowship!” Kagami announced.

“Oh my God! Kagami, that’s great!” Kurenai said. She held out her arms to briefly embrace him, and Kagami laughed and hugged her back, still beaming.

“Congrats!” Naminé said with a grin. She squeezed his shoulder, and without warning, Kagami embraced her in a tight hug.

“Thank you so much for talking to the chief, Dr. Nakano.”

Naminé laughed and patted him on the back, “not a problem. But getting the fellowship was all you. I just spoke highly of you.”

“I know, but I still really appreciate it.” Kagami released her and continued to beam, looking like a little golden retriever who was just so incredibly proud of himself.

“I’m glad. I’m really happy for you,” she said with an easy smile. If there was one person who deserved the fellowship, it was Kagami.

“We’ll definitely have to celebrate,” Kurenai said.

“Absolutely,” Naminé agreed.

Kagami scratched the back of his head and gave them both a sheepish smile, “I’d like that.”

“This time you can get wasted and not Nakano over here,” Kurenai said as she elbowed Naminé in the ribs. Naminé rolled her eyes affectionately and swatted her elbow away.

“Rude,” Naminé remarked. “But she’s right. We definitely need to celebrate.”

Kagami grinned even harder, if that was at all possible. He looked like he was about to say something, but before he could a fourth person walked up to them, coming up to stand beside Naminé.

Naminé craned her neck over her shoulder and stiffened, “Dr. Matsuo.”

Asami gave her a blank look, “an eight-month pregnant woman came in last night after a car accident. I need a consult.”

Naminé nodded, “do you need it right now or can it wait until after rounds?”

Asami’s ice blue eyes flickered down Naminé’s face and rested on her collarbone, where that annoying little bruise was. Naminé shifted from one hip to the other and cleared her throat, putting her hand to the back of her neck and angling her arm in a way that it hid the mark.

Asami made eye contact with her again. “You can round first.”

She didn’t say anything else, she just walked away. Naminé closed her eyes and exhaled, feeling a mixture of irritation, guilt, and even jealousy.

“Who pissed her her cheerios?” Kurenai muttered.

“I did,” Naminé said. She looked back at both Kurenai and Kagami, each of them regarding her with questioning eyes. “I’m gonna start rounds.”

They nodded and then Naminé gave Kagami a small smile, “congrats again, Kagami. You deserve this.”

Kagami’s face lit up as his smile widened, and Naminé couldn’t help but chuckle under her breath because he was just _beaming_.

Then she stepped away and went about her morning, rounding on her patients and dreading the moment she would have to go upstairs for her consultation.

* * *

“He wasn’t bad at all. I’d even go far enough to say that he’s probably the best candidate we’ve had so far,” Hashirama said after the last interviewee, Tatsuma Aburame, had stepped out of the conference room. “Any thoughts?”

“I liked him,” Jiraiya said first. “He’s been slowly working his way up to this type of position, he has fantastic references, and if I’m being perfectly honest, he has Danzo’s temperament, which makes me think that he can handle the job.”

“I couldn’t have said it better myself,” Minato said. “I want to get him in for a second interview as soon as possible.”

“Tobirama?” Hashirama asked.

Tobirama looked up from his computer where he had been taking notes during the interview and nodded.

“I agree. We should reach out to him by end of day,” he said.

“Wonderful!” Hashirama said with a grin. “We’ll go to lunch and then Minato, will you give him a call a little after?”

“Of course,” Minato said.

“All right! Then I will see you all in an hour or so,” Hashirama said, still smiling.

Tobirama leaned back in his chair as he watched Minato and Jiraiya each gather their things and exit the conference room, already having idle conversation.

“What’s wrong?” Hashirama asked, his dark eyes already focused on his younger brother the minute their CEO and CFO were out of the room.

“Nothing’s wrong,” Tobirama said. He turned his attention back to his laptop where he was currently reviewing a new 8-K that Shikaku forwarded him earlier that morning. He wasn’t ashamed to say that he spent a good portion of the first block of interviews reviewing it because the candidates had been dismal. But he actually took notes during Tatsuma’s interview because he saw promise, and now that the interview was over, he wanted to get back to it.

“Well let’s get lunch and celebrate the fact that you might not have to work this hard for much longer,” Hashirama patted Tobirama on his back. “I have a good feeling about this one.”

“You go ahead. I want to finish this,” Tobirama said.

Even though he was looking at his computer screen, Tobirama could feel Hashirama’s eyes steady on him. And eventually, it got to be too distracting, so Tobirama huffed and looked up to meet his brother’s dark eyes.

“What is it?” Tobirama asked.

“I know it feels like we had this conversation just yesterday, but is everything okay?” Hashirama asked as his lips tugged downward into a frown.

“Everything’s fine,” Tobirama said.

“You were distracted yesterday, but oddly focused today. Is something going on?” Hashirama pressed.

Tobirama fought back a sigh. He knew his brother meant well, and he knew it came from a place of affection, but the questions over the last two days made him uncomfortable. He just didn’t want to talk about these things at work. Or at all.

“No. I just want to get this work done,” Tobirama deflected.

“How’s Naminé?” Hashirama asked, very casually planting a hand on his hip and inspecting Tobirama’s face for any signs of distress.

The sound of her name was enough to make him swallow hard enough for Hashirama to hear it, and his brother didn’t miss the gesture because he was immediately raising his eyebrows.

“She’s fine,” Tobirama said.

“That’s good to hear. And the two of you? Are things okay between you?” Hashirama’s voice was very careful, as if he was approaching a stray dog or something of the sort.

Tobirama crossed his arms. He really didn’t want to have this discussion. “We’re fine.”

The corner of Hashirama’s lips twitched downward, “I sincerely hope you two haven’t been fighting. I hope it’s just been harmless bickering.”

Tobirama rubbed the back of his neck, unintentionally bringing his attention to the kink that was still there from the other night when he fell asleep at his desk.

“We fought last night,” he admitted with a casual shrug of his sore shoulders. “But I think things are fine.”

“You think things are fine?” Hashirama repeated.

Tobirama’s eyes flickered as he heard Naminé’s voice echo in the back of his head.

_‘Why would I ever sleep with Madara Uchiha when the only man I have ever wanted in my entire life is standing right in front of me?’_

“I believe so,” Tobirama said.

Hashirama just blinked dumbly, “I don’t follow.”

Tobirama’s eyes flashed up to his brother’s without a second thought, and then just like that, the words were already spilling off his tongue.

“She’s still in love with me,” he muttered.

He wanted to scold himself for being so free and careless with his words, because damnit he shouldn’t have said that.

Hell, that was the whole reason he was trying to keep himself so goddamn focused. If he kept himself as focused as possible, then he couldn’t think about what transpired between him and certain blonde doctor only hours ago. He wouldn’t have had the time to think about what happened, or the way she kissed him before he fell asleep, or the way he brought her into his arms right after.

But with his laser like focus being snapped, the words just came out of their own accord.

Hashirama sank into the chair directly beside Tobirama and nodded, “I know.”

Tobirama looked at his brother curiously, “you know?”

Hashirama gave him a bitter smirk, “Naminé’s not as opaque as she likes to think she is.”

Tobirama could have laughed. “Agreed.”

“You’re not going to have a mental breakdown at this realization, are you? Because I need you to keep it together until we hire a new chief legal counsel,” Hashirama remarked, though he was giving Tobirama a familiar smile.

Tobirama smirked at him and rolled out his neck, “no, I’m not.”

“Good,” Hashirama stood back up and patted Tobirama on his back. “Once we get someone in the position you’ll be free to have all the mental breakdowns you want.”

Tobirama scoffed, “I don’t have mental breakdowns.”

Hashirama snickered, “maybe not in a traditional sense, but you have them just like the rest of us.”

Tobirama rolled his eyes in annoyance and redirected his attention back to his computer.

“Want me to bring you back something to eat?” Hashirama asked.

Tobirama shot a look at his brother. “I’d appreciate that.”

Hashirama grinned, “will do.”

With his brother gone, Tobirama went back to his work. He was trying to be careful with where he directed his attention. He wanted to focus on work and only work, but his mind continued to drift back to Naminé and he was getting sick of it.

He was out of line last night, pushing a subject that really did not need to be pushed. The worst part was that the fighting didn’t even yield anything, because Naminé was bound to still have questions about Asami. The only thing the fighting seemed to yield was Naminé making her feelings known, and that had been unintentional.

She really was still in love with him.

She didn’t say those exact words, but she didn’t have to. Her saying that he was the only man she ever wanted combined with the soft kisses she pressed over his eyes as he fell asleep had been proof enough.

He didn’t know how to feel about that. Not even in the slightest capacity.

He knew he missed her like hell, he knew she drove him absolutely insane, and he knew that there was a part of him that wanted to be with her again, and that there was another part that was scolding himself for having those thoughts.

Tobirama sighed and rubbed his eyes, making the decision to focus on work for now and focus on filling the chief legal counsel position. As soon as that was handled, then he would take time to really think about his relationship with Naminé.

Yeah. That’s how he would handle it.

Now if only his thoughts would cooperate.

* * *

Asami hadn’t even been there when Naminé went up for her consult. Instead of Asami, a fellow was there, and Naminé was actually thankful for that. She didn’t think she had it in her to look Asami in the eye after last night.

Currently, Naminé was in her office, going through some paperwork that desperately needed to be done before Chief Sarutobi put her on probation or something. The morning had been crazy to say the least. Naminé already performed several procedures and it wasn’t until late afternoon did she get a break.

And she was using her break to have some peanut M&M’s and sugary coffee for lunch while she did paperwork.

She had only been working on reports for about a half hour when her phone rang, and Naminé narrowed her eyes as she fished her phone out of her pocket, wondering who possibly could be calling her in the middle of the day. She figured it must have been Madara or even Ibiki calling about her car, but one look at her caller ID told her different.

“Hello?” Naminé answered.

“I’m shocked you answered the phone, Naminé.”

Naminé leaned back in her chair and held in a sigh, “well I’m at work so…”

“That’s why I’m shocked.”

She rubbed the bottom of her chin, “how’ve you been, Hikaku?”

“Better than you,” Hikaku said in an almost too casual tone. “I’m a little surprised you didn’t reach out to me yourself and had your attorney do it instead.”

Naminé nodded even though she knew he couldn’t see it. She should have expected this conversation. Hikaku was one of the key witnesses Toka was bringing in, and she knew that the neurosurgeon was bound to call her at some point to talk about everything. She just let it slip her mind with everything that had been going on.

“I’m sorry. I’ve had a lot going on,” Naminé admitted.

“I understand,” Hikaku said. “Well I’m in the area if you want to meet up for dinner and talk.”

Naminé continued to rub her chin, “I’m working the rest of the week, maybe we can grab lunch next week instead.”

“During the trial?” Hikaku pointed out.

Naminé frowned, “I’m sorry I just—”

Hikaku’s chuckle cut her off, “I see you’re still evasive as ever.”

“Not intentionally,” Naminé said. “I just have a lot going on.”

“Fair enough,” Hikaku said, and there was a pause before he continued. “Let’s grab lunch or something next week. I think we have a lot to talk about.”

She almost cringed, “yeah okay. We can do that.”

“Great,” Hikaku said, still using that casual and relaxed tone from before.

Naminé picked at the corner of her nail, “hey, thanks for this. I really mean it. I wouldn’t blame you if you didn’t want to come. I know this kind of thing is uncomfortable for everyone involved.”

“That’s okay. I want to see that guy in jail almost as much as you do.”

Naminé smirked bitterly to herself. She definitely believed that. Hidan had tormented the whole hospital for a period of time there, whether directly or indirectly. He himself used to show up to stalk Naminé, but then his stupid cult followers also had a tendency to leave their victims in front of the hospital, effectively damaging the hospital’s safety reputation. Hikaku had been one of the many doctors who had to operate on the Jashinists’ victims and deal with the consequences of everything.

“I gotta get back to work,” she said after a long moment of silence.

“All right. I’ll see you next week, Naminé,” Hikaku said.

“Yeah. See you then.”

* * *

The rest of the day was a blur. Naminé didn’t get another break because there was a huge accident on the freeway that resulted in back to back surgeries. So when eight-thirty rolled around and things had finally slowed down enough for her to finish charting, she half considered just sleeping in her office because she was that exhausted.

But instead of doing that, she was on her way to Ibiki’s to pick up her car. Kurenai left around seven, so she had to take a cab there, and honestly, Naminé couldn’t have been anymore grateful to Ibiki for letting her stop by so late.

She walked into a little office attached to a garage, and a man with scars all over his face was seated at a desk typing on a computer.

“You Ibiki?” Naminé asked.

The man looked at her and stood up from the desk, holding his hand out.

“Dr. Nakano,” Ibiki greeted. He gave her a firm handshake and Naminé nodded. “I just wanna say that it’s a good thing we looked at your car. Whoever messed with it really wanted to hurt you.”

Her stomach churned and she frowned, “they wanted to do a lot more than hurt me.”

“I’m not even gonna ask,” Ibiki said with narrowed eyes. He went back to the desk and grabbed a piece of paper and handed it to her.

Naminé looked over the bill and raised an eyebrow at the price.

“Had to charge you a little more for my team’s overtime hours,” Ibiki said with a shrug.

Naminé grabbed her wallet out of her workbag and pulled out a credit card, “it’s fine. I said I would pay you whatever you wanted if you could get it done.”

Ibiki sat down at the desk to process the payment and she grabbed her keys, so goddamn happy to have her car again.

“Here you go, Doc,” Ibiki printed out the receipt and handed back her card. She took both and then gave him a small smile.

“Thank you so much for helping me out,” she said. “I really appreciate it.”

Ibiki nodded and plunged his hands in his pockets, “sure thing. If you notice anything off just bring it back, and I mean that. Anything. Whoever messed with you did it maliciously, so just be really careful.”

Naminé nodded with a sigh, “I definitely will. Thanks.”

He nodded again, “sure thing.”

She got in her car, relieved to see the windshield replaced and relieved to know that Ibiki went out of his way to check for other damage, and headed back to Tobirama’s.

It wasn’t until she was almost there did it dawn on her that she hadn’t taken a single Percocet all day. Normally, the first thing Naminé did in the morning was pop a few pills to get on with her day. But she hadn’t taken anything that morning, and since she was so busy at work she hadn’t stopped to take anything during her shift either.

She almost couldn’t wrap her head around it. Naminé had been relying on the pills to get her through her days for months now. It just felt… Odd.

But hey, she wasn’t going to question it. Going a whole day without any pills was something to be proud of, and she would take that where she could get it.

When Naminé finally got to Tobirama’s she hit the lock button on her keys probably four of five times and held her breath as she walked inside. She almost had half the mind to worry about walking in to see him with Asami again, but the minute she stepped through the door she mentally chided herself for letting such a stupid thought cross her mind.

She peeled off her jacket and kicked off her shoes with a yawn. She was really drained from the craziness of her shift, and there was a dull ache in her hands from the back to back surgeries.

But hey, at least her back wasn’t causing her debilitating pain. So a dull ache in her hands was practically a good thing.

Naminé made her way into the kitchen to see if Tobirama was there, but it was empty, meaning he must have been in his upstairs office instead. She was actually a little relieved, because it meant she could hold off on having an uncomfortable conversation with him for just a little bit longer. So she massaged her hands a bit as she got a glass of water, and then eventually walked upstairs to change into her pajamas, pausing only when she walked by Tobirama’s office and spotted him working in there.

She doubted he even noticed her in the doorway because he seemed intently focused on whatever it was he was doing on his computer, glasses on as he read over a document and occasionally typed something on the keyboard.

She set her workbag down just outside the door and knocked on the wall when he gave no indication of being aware of her presence.

He looked away from his computer and at where she stood in the threshold of the doorway and paused, removing his glasses and rubbing his eyes.

“Hey,” she said softly. Her stomach fluttered and she had to swallow back a lump in her throat because they really had to talk, and she wasn’t sure either one of them were prepared for that.

“You’re back late,” Tobirama said after he set his glasses down on the desk and leaned further back into his chair.

“Yeah, I had to pick up my car. It’s as good as new,” Naminé said. She was careful to keep her voice quiet and soft, just in case he had a hard day and was on edge.

But he didn’t seem on edge or anything of the sort, he just kinda nodded as his eyes were steady and still on her.

“Good,” was all he said.

She bit the inside of her cheek and decided to actually walk into the room instead of just hanging around in the doorway. There wasn’t another chair or anywhere for her to sit, so she leaned against the far side of his desk.

He raised an eyebrow at where she chose to stand, but didn’t reprimand her or tell her to move, despite maybe being a little closer to him than necessary.

“So there’s something I wanted to ask you,” she started, looking down to play with the sleeves of her shirt. She intended on asking him this last night, but she got sidetracked with… Everything.

“What’s that?” Tobirama asked.

She looked up to meet his steady eyes, “Toka thinks I should have someone there with me when I testify. And I was wondering if maybe you could come?”

Tobirama actually looked mildly surprised, and then Naminé was feeling stupid again so she quickly cut in before he could even respond, “I know you’re really busy with work and I’m supposed to testify on Tuesday. So you don’t have to come if you’re really busy. I just… Well I thought I would ask.”

She viciously picked at her nail beds with her heart all the way up in her throat as she waited for a quick explanation for why he couldn’t come, but Tobirama didn’t give her a hard time or say that he couldn’t because of work. He just kept that calm gaze on her.

“I can be there,” he said.

She blinked and narrowed her eyes. Really? It was that easy?

“Are you sure? You’re not too busy with work?” She pressed.

“I am, but I can always get any missed work done at night or in the morning. Toka’s right. You should have someone there.”

Naminé stared and then began to massage one of her hands. She couldn’t believe it had been that easy. When the hell did Tobirama give in so quickly? When the hell did he ever put his work on hold for another person?

“Wow. I never thought I would live to see the day that you said Toka was right,” Naminé teased.

A small, barely even noticeable, smile ghosted across his face.

Naminé couldn’t help it when a smile began to curl onto her own face and it felt like a weight had finally been lifted from her chest. She caught the way his eyes focused on her face and on where she was smiling to herself, so she cleared her throat and changed the subject so she didn’t look like an idiot blushing schoolgirl any longer.

“Any luck with finding your new legal person?” She asked. She had forgotten the proper title, but had remembered that he was trying to find someone to take a vacant position in the company. She also remembered that it had been the source of most of his stress the last few weeks.

“Chief legal counsel,” he said with ease. “And actually yes. We found a promising candidate today. With any luck we’ll have the position filled soon.”

“So you’ll finally get the chance to relax then,” she said.

“Not likely,” Tobirama remarked. He swiveled in his office chair so he was facing her more directly now, and his knee grazed the side of her leg since she was still partially leaning against his desk.

“No? I think some time off would be good for you. Get an actual eight hours of sleep instead of three,” she said. She may have been teasing him just a little, but it was all in good fun. And he didn’t seem at all bothered by her words. If anything, he seemed a little amused.

“Says the surgeon,” Tobirama said as he leaned back and crossed his arms over his chest, immediately bringing her attention to those broad shoulders of his.

She smirked and rubbed the back of her neck, “well we’re not talking about me. We’re talking about you and your unhealthy work schedule.”

He smirked back, “that’s the pot calling the kettle black.”

Naminé actually laughed under her breath and she tucked a lock of hair behind her ear, “fair enough.”

He continued to smirk at her, but he was quiet and Naminé’s stomach sank. They really had to talk, even though she didn’t want to. She had almost no desire to bring it up, but she couldn’t let it sit for much longer because it just left her feeling jittery and confused and awkward, and she really hated being like that.

“Um,” she cleared her throat. “We should probably talk.”

His eyes flickered as if he had been expecting that. Then he nodded and said, “we should.”

Her stomach churned and she went back to picking at her nails. “I’m sorry for what I said yesterday. I was upset and overreacted. It wasn’t right.”

Tobirama let out a sigh and his knee bumped her leg again. “Yes well, I didn’t exactly help the situation.”

Naminé almost wanted to laugh because it was such a Tobirama-esque “apology". The man didn’t really apologize for anything. Unless he truly believed with his heart and soul that he messed something up and messed it up badly, he was as unapologetic as they came. Hell, he would deny it until the end of time, but he was more unapologetic than even Madara was. So that was the closest thing to an apology she was going to get and she was okay with that.

“Hopefully you’re not still mad at me,” she said.

His eyes flickered to hers and held her in a steady gaze, “I’m not.”

And she really believed him. Between the way he was looking at her, his body language, and the easy conversation they had just moments ago, she really believed him with all of her heart.

“I’m glad to hear it,” she said with the tiniest of smiles.

He nodded but didn’t say anything back, leaving the ball in Naminé’s court. She really didn’t want to be the one to address the elephant in the room, and honestly, Tobirama was better at doing those things anyway.

“So,” she mumbled as her eyes darted around the room. He was really going to make her say it, wasn’t he?

“So,” he repeated. Naminé’s eyes flashed back to him and she wished she looked or even felt half as composed as he appeared.

“Seriously? You’re going to make me say it?” She asked with a frown.

Tobirama very casually raised his eyebrows, “say what?”

Her eye twitched, “you’re the worst. Do you know that?” He smirked in response but didn’t speak up, forcing her to go on with an exasperated huff. “Are we going to pretend that the whole random sex thing didn’t happen or…?”

Tobirama kept his arms crossed when he said a calm, “I didn’t think it was random.”

Naminé stared at him, a little dumbfounded. How the hell he managed to stay so composed regarding everything would forever be a mystery to her.

“I guess not. But we should probably address it or something, right?”

“We should,” Tobirama said after he let out a soft sigh, about to take control of the conversation. “I asked you the other night what you wanted from me, and you said you didn’t want anything. You said you just wanted me, but not in a romantic sense… Did you mean that?”

Naminé’s mouth felt dryer than a desert and she immediately resumed picking her nails. There wasn’t a good way to avoid this or divert the question.

She sucked in a deep breath. She guessed now was as good a time as ever to come clean.

“Would you believe me if I said yes?” She muttered. She couldn’t even look him in the eyes as she said it. So she stared at her hands instead and listened for his response.

“…No.”

Naminé closed her eyes to work up enough nerve, and then she forced herself to look at him.

“Well good because I didn’t,” she admitted in a voice just a breath above a whisper. Every nerve in her body told her to look away from his gaze that was just too intense for his own good, but she held her ground for as long as she could. “I really did try to mean it. I just… I couldn’t. You probably knew I couldn’t.”

She finally looked away when it all got to be too much. She meant what she said. She tried to mean it. She tried to only want him as a friend, but she just couldn’t. He was Tobirama for Christ’s sake. She would never be able to just be friends with him. She would either have to move to a different city again to avoid him entirely, or just be up front with him and let him decide what to do.

“I had a feeling,” Tobirama said after a moment of silence. “I’m not ignoring the situation. I want to talk about this, I just don’t know how I feel right now.”

Naminé could understand that. Hell, she barely even knew how she felt. And compared to Tobirama, Naminé was much better at dealing with those types of emotions, and Naminé herself wasn’t all that good at it either.

“I understand,” she said.

She still wasn’t looking directly at him, but through her peripheral vision she could see him lean forward just slightly.

“Good,” he said. “We’ll talk about this when things at work settle down and I’ve had time to think about everything.”

Her eyes flickered up to meet his and she nodded. She could live with that.

“That seems fair,” she said softly.

He looked at her long and hard, the way he did when he was giving anything serious thought. And any other person would have felt horrifically uncomfortable beneath that intense stare, but Naminé wasn’t just any other person. Sure, holding that gaze with him was difficult, but she didn’t necessarily feel uncomfortable with him looking at her like that. If anything it actually made her feel better, because it meant he was taking her seriously.

“You look tired. Why don’t you go to bed?” He suggested, his voice soft and composed.

Naminé’s stomach did a somersault and she fiddled with her sleeves again.

“Does that mean I’m allowed to sleep downstairs again? Because the couch in the library feels like a brick and—”

“I said bed. Not couch,” Tobirama said right away. He looked away from her and went back to his computer, acting like he didn’t even care about what the hell he just said.

Naminé raised her eyebrows, “I thought we already established that you’re the one who sleeps in the bed because it’s yours.”

Tobirama didn’t even look at her, still focused with his laptop instead. “We did.”

Naminé blinked dumbly a few times. Had she heard that right?

“So then…”

“It’s a large bed. I don’t think it’s an issue if we both sleep in it. It’s better for your back anyway,” he said. And damn. He could not have looked anymore nonchalant if he tried.

“…Are you sure?” She asked as her eyes widened.

“I’m sure. Now go to bed,” Tobirama insisted. He finally turned away from his computer and looked at her almost affectionately. “I’ll be in when I’m finished.”

Naminé’s heart pounded in her chest and she nodded, pushing herself away from where she leaned against his desk.

“Okay,” she said. Tobirama went back to his work and Naminé left the office, went into the bathroom to change into pajamas, and then went into the bedroom.

She lied down on the side away from the door and rubbed her temples. She thought about what Kurenai said to her at work, about how she didn’t think Naminé just wanted sex, but rather she wanted Tobirama himself. She thought about the Asami stuff. She thought about the previous night and the way she fell asleep in Tobirama’s arms.

Naminé let out a deep sigh and rolled over onto her side.

At least she had said her peace and now the ball was in Tobirama’s court.

She could live with that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Updates might take a little longer since I'm swamped with stuff for grad school! Sorry about that!
> 
> Drop a comment please and thank you!


	16. Chapter 16

It was storming.

There was thunder booming every few seconds, there was lightning illuminating the house between every clap of thunder, and there was rain pounding hard enough on the roof to make Tobirama wonder if it was actually ice instead of water because it had been that loud.

The clock was just about to strike two in the morning and Naminé still hadn’t gotten back yet. Tobirama tried not to worry because she didn’t get in until one-thirty last night, so she probably was still at the hospital or she was already on her way back.

But the fact that there was a freak storm going on did absolutely nothing to calm his nerves. He didn’t like her being out this late to begin with because of the Hidan bullshit, and the weather only set his teeth more on edge. He just couldn’t relax until he knew she was safe because every minute that ticked by was a minute spent worrying if Hidan had been waiting for her out in the hospital parking lot, or if he ran her off the road.

He knew it was a ludicrous thought, but the thought was there nonetheless, and he blamed it on his overprotective nature.

Tobirama tried to distract himself by changing into his pajamas and lying in bed as he read over a report for Konoha Enterprises. He rubbed his tired eyes as he did, just wanting Naminé to come back already so he could have peace of mind and go to sleep. Because there was no way in hell he was going to be able to fall sleep until he knew she was safe.

He wasn’t sure how much time passed, maybe twenty minutes or so, when he noticed headlights from his bedroom window, signaling Naminé’s arrival.

He let out a sigh of relief and listened carefully for the front door to open and close downstairs, and when it did, he could feel the tension leave his shoulders.

It was about damn time.

A few minutes or so went by, and then he could hear Naminé’s light footsteps as she came upstairs.

“You’re still up?” She asked as she poked her head into the bedroom, probably wondering why the light was still on. Tobirama looked away from his report and blinked a few times in surprise at her appearance.

She was absolutely soaking wet, almost as if she had jumped in a pool with her clothes on. Her ashy blonde hair dripped onto her shoulders the way it might have after she got out of the shower, her light gray sweatshirt looked like it was the color of charcoal because there was so much water in it, and her jeans looked as if they were glued to her legs.

“Did you not have a jacket on?” Tobirama asked, ignoring her question entirely.

Naminé pushed her sopping wet hair away out her face and leaned against the frame of the door.

“Well I did. But when I tried to leave at eight I had a trauma come in and the guy kinda… Well… He was about to collapse, so I caught him, and then he puked up blood all over my jacket. So no. I did not have a jacket on,” Naminé explained. Tobirama grimaced and his eyes raked over her frame for a second time.

He knew there had been a freak storm going on, but it definitely must have been raining harder than he even realized because there was a steadily growing puddle of water around her feet.

“So what did you do with your jacket?” Tobirama asked.

“I had to throw it out,” Naminé said. “Normally I would have washed it at work, but there was no saving it.”

He sighed and frowned at her. They were in the middle of winter and Naminé didn’t have a goddamn jacket anymore? Did she enjoy making him worry so much?

“Don’t look at me like that,” Naminé said. “It was gross. And I deal with blood all day every day, so that means a lot coming from me.”

“You are dripping water all over my hardwood floors,” Tobirama pointed out as he glared at the puddle around her feet.

Naminé huffed and rolled her eyes. “Your concern for my wellbeing is touching.”

She had no clue how concerned he was for her wellbeing, and you know what? He wanted it to stay that way. Considering the weird state that their relationship was in, he didn’t necessarily want her knowing that he couldn’t even fall sleep until he knew she was safe and sound.

“You are sopping wet and your lips are turning blue. Go take a warm shower or put dry clothes on,” he muttered as he looked back at his report. “You look like you just jumped in a pool fully clothed.”

There was a lighthearted chuckled from where she stood and he could see her in his peripheral vision crossing her arms over her chest.

“This is from me running out to the parking lot and then running up to your front door. It’s like a monsoon out there,” she remarked.

Tobirama huffed and looked away from his report again to scan her expression. Her hair was sticking to her face in wet locks and her lips were in fact starting to turn a shade of bluish purple, and he really just wanted her to get into dry clothes before she got hypothermia.

“Would you hurry up and change out of those clothes already?” He asked in exasperation.

“Why? You don’t want me getting into bed like this?” She teased.

Tobirama’s eye twitched. “Naminé.”

She grinned and tilted her chin up. “Tobirama.”

“Insufferable woman,” he grumbled. He looked back at the report and made a silent resolve to not look at her again. “Go. You’re making a mess.”

She said something under her breath that he didn’t quite catch and walked away before he could ask her what she said.

He let out a sigh and rubbed his eyes, equal parts relieved that she was finally home and exhausted from waiting up for her. But at least now he would be able to relax since he knew she was safe.

He let his eyes scan over the rest of the report, hoping to be done with it by the time Naminé came back to go to sleep.

When he suggested that she sleep in the bed with him the other night, he only did it for the sake of his own sanity. He just couldn’t keep losing sleep because of how worried he was. Even when Naminé agreed to sleep upstairs in the library, he still was concerned about her nonetheless. He knew that he was being paranoid, and that the thoughts he had of Hidan breaking in and killing her while he slept were absolutely ludicrous, but he couldn’t help it. He was intensely protective of anyone he considered a friend or family, and Naminé fell somewhere in between, so naturally he wanted to protect her too.

And if either of them thought that sharing a bed was going to be awkward, then they were both pleasantly surprised at how easy it had been. The bed was big enough that they each could have their own respective sides with ample space between them, and Tobirama hardly moved at all when he slept, and Naminé had been oddly good at keeping herself on her side of the bed. So there had yet to be an issue.

That was what Tobirama was most surprised with. When he and Naminé used to live together and share a bed, she had been the absolute worst. She used to always toss and turn in her sleep, roll from side to side, and then somehow always end up on his side of the bed with all of the blankets bundled around her. In fact, when they first moved in together he wanted to make her sleep on the couch because it had been downright miserable. But he quickly learned that the best way to keep Naminé still at night was to put an arm around her and hold her there. For whatever reason it seemed to calm her, even in her sleeping state, so he learned to just do that. Which had been fine because it eventually grew on him.

But overall, things hadn’t been weird or awkward. They had been startlingly easy, and with his new peace of mind, Tobirama was finally able to sleep better.

Naminé eventually came back in the room in a pair of cloth shorts that were probably a little too short and a thin t-shirt that could have passed for a dress. Her hair was still wet and from what he could tell, her lips still had that blue tint to them.

But at least she was in dry clothes, so that was a start.

She walked over to the side of the bed that was away from the door and lied down, propping herself on her elbow and looked at him as she cocked her head to the side.

“Aren’t you tired?” She asked.

He was goddamn exhausted, both physically and mentally.

“Very,” he answered.

“I don’t know how reading that stuff doesn’t put you to sleep then,” she said with a yawn as she rested her head on the pillow and curled onto her side as she faced him.

“Who said it didn’t,” he remarked, and from the corner of his eye he could see a smile curl onto her face, and if he didn’t know any better, he would say he felt a slight flutter in his stomach.

“Fair enough,” she said.

There were only a few more paragraphs to read, and then Tobirama swore to himself that he would go to sleep the second he was done.

But then his thoughts were interrupted by his bed rattling not once, but twice.

He looked up, blinking in confusion. What the hell was that?

The bed rattled a third time and then before he could get up and actually look around to figure out where the hell it was coming from, Naminé huffed and interrupted his train of thought.

“Sorry,” she said.

“Is that you?” Tobirama asked he looked over his shoulder to see her curling into a tiny ball.

“Well yeah. It’s freezing in here. I don’t know how you don’t have a shirt on,” she explained.

This time he caught the involuntary shiver that wracked through Naminé’s body, and the corner of his lips tugged downward.

“It’s not that cold in here,” Tobirama muttered.

Naminé huffed, “tell my shivering that!”

“Maybe it’s because you just got out of the rain and have damp hair,” he said without missing a beat.

She scoffed and then sat up, inching closer and reaching her hand out. “Feel my fingers! They’re like ice!”

Before he could even protest, she pressed her icy cold fingers against the side of his neck, making him jerk away from her touch.

For Christ’s sake her fingers really did feel like ice.

“Why the hell are you so cold?” Tobirama complained. He set his report on the nightstand, having given up on finishing it, and got out of bed to make his way over to the thermostat. If Naminé’s fingers were really that cold and if her shivering was rattling the bed, then fine. He would turn the heat up for the night, even though he knew the only reason she was that cold was because she had been in the rain.

“Because it is freezing in here,” she reiterated.

He rolled his eyes, already having adjusted the thermostat, and then for added measure, walked over to his closet and opened it up, relying on muscle memory to reach for a faded blue sweatshirt that he knew was hanging up in there.

Once his fingers brushed against the familiar soft and worn down fabric, he pulled it off the hanger and walked back over to the bed, tossing the sweatshirt to Naminé.

She sat up, the blankets falling away from her shoulders and revealing her bare arms that were rippling with gooseflesh. She gave the hoodie a once over, just before her eyes met his, and pulled it over her shoulders.

“Thanks,” she said once she was wearing his sweatshirt.

Tobirama’s eyes lingered on her, his chest tightening in a way that he was starting to become more and more familiar with. She just looked horribly endearing in his sweatshirt that was too big for her. And even though he might not admit it out loud, he liked the way she looked in his clothes. There was just something really personal about it that made him feel almost jumpy in a way.

He didn’t say anything back to her, he just sat down on the edge of the bed and turned the light off, lying down on his stomach as he folded his arms over his head.

Naminé didn’t shiver anymore after that and with the knowledge that she was safe with him, he fell into an easy sleep.

* * *

Falling asleep with damp hair and wearing a pair of shorts definitely did not help how cold Naminé was, but when she had fallen asleep she thought she had finally started to warm up. Tobirama turned the heat up and he even gave her a hoodie to wear, so naturally she had started to feel much warmer. At least she thought she had.

But when the light spilled into Tobirama’s room early in the morning and waking her up, she realized that she was not nearly as warm as she thought she had been when she fell asleep.

She could barely feel her legs, hands, and nose, and Naminé groaned in frustration as she pulled the collar of Tobirama’s sweatshirt up over her nose, downright desperate to get warmer.

While that little gesture may have returned the feeling to her nose again, it definitely did nothing to help her fall back asleep. And that was mainly due to the fact that every time she breathed in she was surrounded by Tobirama. The sheets smelled like him, the room smelled like him, and the sweatshirt really smelled like him. It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing. It was just that the scent of his cologne and deodorant mixed together with the faintness of his skin actually made her stomach flutter.

And that was precisely the problem.

She couldn’t fall back asleep if the incessant fluttering in her stomach wouldn’t stop, and considering that every single breath she took made her stomach flutter even more with longing and nostalgia, she doubted she would be able to fall asleep anytime soon.

She intended on getting up and going downstairs to make some coffee and relax, but any thoughts of doing that came to an abrupt halt when Tobirama shifted around so he was lying on his side and facing her.

Naminé blinked away the sleep from her eyes and took the opportunity to look at him. She liked how peaceful he looked while he was sleeping. There were no creases in his forehead, no faint lines around his mouth from frowning all the time, and no tension between his brows from glaring.

He looked so peaceful that it almost hurt.

As if feeling her gaze on him, Tobirama eyes slowly fluttered open and for whatever reason, she felt the need to hold her breath.

“Hey,” she said so softly that she doubted he even heard it, because she barely heard it herself.

But he must have, because he sucked in a breath and rubbed his eyes.

“Hey,” he said back.

Naminé used to love mornings with him more than anything else. Tobirama was always much softer when he just woke up, and it used to be the time of day where he was most affectionate.

Even when they were engaged, Tobirama wasn’t big on affection. A soft kiss here or there or spooning at night, but that was about it. It wasn’t that he had been against being so open with his affections, it was just how he was. Affectionate gestures from Tobirama were meant to be kept private and personal, reserved for those moments where he felt particularly loving.

So when they were together, she used to love the mornings more than anything else, when he wasn’t so on guard and when he was just waking up. It had been the one time he would be more likely to bring her into his arms or kiss her soft enough to make her head spin.

And this was the first time that Naminé had actually woken up to him. The other mornings she had woken up were long before the sun was even in the sky, and she generally was in a rush to get to work, so any potential awkwardness or anything else had easily been avoided. _This_ was the first time they actually had to face each other in the morning, and she wasn’t quite sure how she felt about that.

“It’s freezing in here,” she said quietly as a smile tugged at the corner of her lips without her permission.

Instead of rolling his eyes, or scoffing, or calling her insufferable, Tobirama actually smirked and let his eyes flutter shut again.

“I’m sorry to hear that,” he said. His voice was husky from just waking up, and her heart skipped a beat at the sound of it.

She pulled the hoodie up over her nose again and kept her eyes focused on him as he faded in and out of sleep.

Tobirama didn’t open his eyes, but he did mutter out a soft, “you’re staring at me.”

“I am,” Naminé admitted.

“Of course you are,” he said in that same half asleep voice, the one that made her heart skip a beat.

“You want me to stop?” She asked very quietly.

“No,” he answered with a deep sigh. “If it makes you happy then I don’t care.”

Naminé narrowed her eyes for a split second, wondering if he realized what he said. She decided not to push it though, so she smiled to herself and pulled the sleeves of his sweatshirt down over her hands, gradually becoming more alert.

She probably should have just gotten up since she doubted she was going to be able to fall back asleep, but aside from the chill that settled in her bones, she was comfortable where she was.

Granted, that didn’t stop the shiver that wracked through her body, and Naminé rolled her eyes. If the shivering was a precursor to her getting sick from being out in the rain yesterday, then she was going to lose her damn mind.

“I take it you’re still cold,” Tobirama mumbled with his eyes closed.

“Little bit,” she said under her breath. She hoped he would fall back asleep since he didn’t get much sleep to begin with, and maybe she’d be able to slip away and take a hot shower without disturbing him any further.

“Mm,” he hummed. If Naminé didn’t know him so well, she would have thought he had fallen right back into a deep sleep judging from the steadiness of his breathing, but she knew otherwise, because there was the smallest little crease between his brows that made it obvious to her that he was still awake, albeit not very.

Naminé could have laughed at how harmless he looked when he was like this, but she refrained. Instead, she very quietly shifted so she was lying on her back and rubbed her eyes as she looked at the ceiling, listening to the sound of gentle rain against the window.

“Do you want me to turn the heat up?” He murmured.

“No. I want you to go back to sleep,” she whispered, sitting up and ignoring his comment. She was about to head downstairs to make coffee and give Tobirama some much needed peace and quiet.

“Are you going somewhere?” He asked. His voice was still rough with exhaustion, but he definitely was becoming more and more lucid with each passing moment.

“Downstairs,” she answered. She looked over her shoulder one more time and was surprised to see him looking at her with surprisingly clear eyes for someone who had just woken up only a minute or two ago.

“It’ll be colder down there than up here,” he said matter-of-factly.

She gave him a wicked smirk, unable to hold off on taking a shot when he left himself so wide open for one.

“You trying to make me stay in bed with you?” She teased.

Tobirama smirked at her and closed his eyes as if he had been expecting that. Then with his eyes still closed, he said a very casual, “and if I was?”

She couldn’t help it when she almost gaped at him, because whoa, she wasn’t used to him being smooth like that. Tobirama only ever made comments like that when he felt completely at ease with whoever he was with.

Her stomach fluttered and she pressed her lips together as a way to hold back a smile.

“Then all you’d have to do is ask,” she remarked, almost testing him to see if his comment from a second ago had been a fluke due to his half awake state or not.

“Then stay,” Tobirama said. His eyes were still closed and she just about lost her goddamn mind at his words.

She blinked and came back with a very confused, “who are you and what have you done with Tobirama Senju?”

He sighed and his eyes fluttered open, giving her that trademark scowl of his. Only due to how sleepy he was, it wasn’t very threatening.

“Are you going to lie down with me or not?”

“Okay,” she muttered, still very, _very_ confused. She knew that Tobirama used to be much more affectionate in the morning, and that when he first woke up he usually showed his more tender side, but considering the state of their relationship (because seriously, what the fuck were they?) she doubted that he would knowingly show her that side again.

Naminé lied back down and faced him as he closed his eyes, admiring the serene look on his face. She didn’t know what the hell was going on, but she could at least admit to herself that she liked it, and that she liked lying in bed with him as she listened to the rain early in the morning. It made her relax in a way she hadn’t done in a long, long time.

“I’m guessing you don’t work today,” Tobirama said under his breath.

“It’s my weekend off,” Naminé answered.

“I figured,” he said as he opened his eyes. “Did you warm up at all?”

“A little,” she said. “Feel. My fingers aren’t ice cubes anymore.”

Naminé rested her hand against the side of his face to prove a point, and after a brief moment she pulled it away. There was a ghost of a smirk on Tobirama’s face, and Naminé was relieved when he didn’t recoil at her touch.

“They’re still a little cold,” he noticed. Then his eyes flickered down her face to momentarily linger on her lips before they flashed back up to her own eyes. “Your lips are also still blue.”

Naminé’s fingertips brushed her lips. “There’s no way.”

“Why are you so cold? You should have warmed up by now,” Tobirama said as he took in a deep inhale, still trying to wake up.

“I have no idea,” Naminé mumbled. “I should probably go drink something hot at this rate.”

“Probably,” he agreed.

“I would actually, but you told me to stay,” she teased as she chuckled breathlessly. He didn’t look at all bothered and gave her that same lazy smirk from earlier.

“I did,” he said.

She could get used to this. She liked being able to give him lighthearted teases. It made her feel warm and touchy feely and stupid. But she still liked it nonetheless.

“I still think you might be an alien or something,” she remarked. “The Tobirama I know would never ask a woman to stay in bed with him.”

He rolled his eyes, but he didn’t seem annoyed or put off. On the contrary, he seemed pretty comfortable, still lacking any tension in his face or shoulders.

“I’m fairly certain I’ve asked you to stay in bed with me before,” he said so nonchalantly that she didn’t even think twice about his words.

“Maybe when we were teenagers and you didn’t feel like facing your brothers first thing in the morning,” she said as she smiled.

“Or maybe when our heat broke in that awful apartment we had on fifth street,” he murmured.

Laughter bubbled in her stomach as she remembered that little apartment she and Tobirama first moved into when she was only twenty.

“Remember when Hashirama came over and that weird lady across the hall thought he was a girl because of his hair?”

Tobirama actually cracked a little bit of a grin and to say her heart stopped at the sight of him smiling, even if it was only a little bit, would have been a gross understatement.

“I forgot about that,” he admitted.

“She was nuts,” Naminé said with a big grin plastered on her face.

“She wasn’t that bad,” he said, even though the smirk on his lips told her different.

“Are you kidding? She cornered me in the laundry room one time and wouldn’t shut up about her cats and then proceeded to critique my underwear while I was folding our clothes!”

Tobirama looked like he was about to start laughing, but he was just a little too stoic for that, so he opted for pinching the bridge of his nose to hide the smirk on his face. But it was enough for Naminé to know that he was about three seconds away from actually letting loose and laughing for once.

“She called me a hussy!” She said. She propped herself up on her elbow and lazily nudged Tobirama’s shoulder as he tried to compose himself. “I _know_ you remember that.”

“I do,” he said after he managed to get control of the laughter that was threatening to bubble to the surface. “You should have just brought the laundry upstairs.”

“There was no point. I was almost done,” Naminé deflected.

“She never gave me a hard time,” Tobirama said. He removed his hand from his face and rubbed the back of his neck as he looked up at where Naminé was still leaning on her elbow.

“Yeah because she liked to watch you come back from runs all sweaty and shirtless,” she said with an eye roll.

Tobirama smirked and shook his head, sitting up and resting his elbows on his knees, letting his head hang between his shoulders.

“If I remember correctly, you liked that too,” he said.

“I was your girlfriend. I was allowed to like it,” Naminé retorted. “I wasn’t some creepy old lady across the hall who used to listen to us have sex.”

Tobirama snickered and looked at her over his shoulder. “That was your fault. You’ve always been too loud.”

Her eye twitched. There were a million things she could have said in response. That it was _his_ fault she had been loud. That that didn’t justify that lady’s weird behavior. That he didn’t have to look so smug.

Instead she opted for a lame, “you are the worst. Do you know that?”

“And you are insufferable,” he said with a very light tone.

She rolled her eyes, though she wasn’t actually annoyed. She liked this type of banter with him. She liked not having to revert back to biting sarcasm as a defense mechanism. She liked the stress-free conversation and reminiscing, and she liked how relaxed Tobirama was. This was easy. And she really liked it.

“We have some good stories, huh?” She asked under her breath. Her eyes fell away from his strong back and instead focused on where her hands were covered by the sleeves of his sweatshirt.

“Mm,” he hummed. “We do.”

She kept her eyes low and her smile devolved into a weak smirk, one to spite herself as she picked at her nails.

She liked reminiscing and remembering easier times, but it didn’t really help the ache in her chest.

Honestly, nothing helped the ache in her chest.

“What is it?” Tobirama asked after a bout of silence.

She looked up to see his eyes focused on where she was leaning on her elbow and Naminé bit down on the back of her bottom lip.

“Nothing. I’m just thinking,” she said.

His eyes softened as he regarded her and asked, “about me?”

She couldn’t hold his gaze much longer, so her eyes flickered down. “Yeah.”

A heavy sigh came from Tobirama and before she knew it, he leaned back so he was no longer leaning on his knees, but rather so he was reclining back on his elbow the same way she was.

“Naminé, look at me,” he said so gently that she could feel her legs ripple with gooseflesh.

She reluctantly met his eyes and goddamnit, why did she have to feel so _exposed_ beneath his gaze?

“I still don’t know how I feel about everything. But…” He trailed off, seemingly searching for the right words. Naminé could appreciate that. Tobirama wasn’t like his brother when it came to saying the right thing at the right time. If anything, he actually had a bit of a tendency to make things worse with how harsh and blunt he could be.

She waited for him to continue, but he sighed in frustration and never finished his sentence.

Instead, he rested his hand on the back of her neck and closed the gap between them in one continuous motion, kissing her gently on the mouth and drawing the breath out of her with little to no effort, leaving her a blushing, stammering, _mess_.

Then as quick as he kissed her, he pulled back and kept his eyes low.

“Now do me a favor and go take a warm shower because your lips are still blue.”

* * *

Hashirama walked up the steps that led to Tobirama’s front door, grabbing the spare key and letting himself in. He held a bag of bagels in one hand and a coffee in the other, juggling them as he hurried inside to get out of the rain. He always felt a little bad when he showed up without any coffee for Tobirama, but his brother always insisted that the coffee from the bagel shop tasted burnt, so Hashirama just let him go ahead and make his own damn coffee.

He usually came over around ten on Saturday morning, and he was a little early since it was only nine-thirty, but he doubted Tobirama would care since his brother seemed to wake up at the crack of dawn every day of the week anyway.

So Hashirama made his way to the kitchen and wasn’t surprised at all to see Tobirama at the table with his laptop open and working on something.

“Uh-uh,” Hashirama said right away. “You know the deal. I bring you breakfast and you stop working for ninety minutes.”

Tobirama’s eyes flashed up to Hashirama and he glared for a long moment, but he eventually huffed and closed the computer, going over to the coffee pot and refilling a mug.

“No Naminé this morning?” Hashirama noticed right away. Had he not seen her car in the driveway, he would have assumed that the blonde woman was either at the hospital or had already stormed out in a fit of rage after one of hers and Tobirama’s spats.

“She’s in the shower,” Tobirama answered as he brought the mug of coffee to his lips.

“Oh good. So she hasn’t stormed out in a fit of rage then,” Hashirama teased.

“Brother,” Tobirama warned. Hashirama snickered and sat down on one of the stools at the kitchen island, pulling out a cinnamon raisin bagel for himself, and a sesame for Tobirama.

“So I’m thinking tomorrow is going to be the last family dinner until Mito has the baby,” Hashirama said after Tobirama handed him a knife to cut the bagels with. “She said she’s fine, but I know cooking for everyone stresses her out, so I put my foot down.”

“Mm,” Tobirama hummed, sitting on the stool across from him and nursing his coffee.

“So I hope you’ll bring Naminé again,” Hashirama suggested. He held back a smirk because he knew that there was a chance Tobirama might bite his head off for bringing her up. So he went out of his way to _not_ smile.

“Bring me where?”

Hashirama looked away from his brother to see Naminé coming into the kitchen with hair still damp from a shower, in a pair of fitted jeans, and a blue hoodie that appeared to be a few sizes too big for her.

“To family dinner,” Hashirama answered with a grin. He watched her carefully as she poured herself a cup of coffee, shoveled sugar into it, and walked over to them, sitting beside Hashirama instead of his brother. “I hope you’ll be there since you had to leave early last time.”

“Uh yeah. If Tobirama is okay with it,” she said as her eyes flickered over to where Tobirama was watching them both with a supremely uninterested look on his face.

“I don’t have an issue with it,” he said to her.

Hashirama narrowed his eyes for a fraction of a second, catching the weighted look between his brother and Naminé. Hashirama wasn’t one to typically notice those types of things, but he had spent the better part of his life watching his brother and Naminé look at each other like that, and it was just enough for him to become curious.

She and Tobirama definitely seemed to be on better terms this weekend compared to last, and he was over the moon about that. The last thing he wanted was to walk in on them in the middle of a fight again, and that only made him all the more interested.

“Perfect. Mito will be happy to see you,” he said.

Naminé gave Hashirama a little smile. “Are you excited to be a dad?”

Hashirama grinned so hard that it hurt. He didn’t even think that there were words to describe how ecstatic he was.

“You have no idea,” he gushed. “The baby finally started kicking.”

“That’s so exciting,” Naminé said as her face lit up. “Does the baby move a lot?”

“Mito says only when I’m around,” he said as he felt his face blush, a little embarrassed and a little excited at the same time.

“That’s because the baby knows you’re going to be the one spoiling them,” Naminé remarked with a pretty smile that made Hashirama warm with nostalgia. It was almost a little surreal having this conversation with her. He just always figured that Tobirama was going to be the first one with a kid because of how much dating around Hashirama used to do. While he was going on casual dates and being a little too free with his affections, his brother was the one in a committed relationship. Hell, he didn’t even settle down until much later in life—especially when one took into consideration the fact that Tobirama was going to get married in his early twenties.

So the fact that he was married and having a kid first was just… Well it was weird.

“Mito has already given me the lecture,” Hashirama said with a chuckle.

“Someone will have to spoil the kid,” Naminé remarked. “Toka sure as hell won’t. Tsunade will gamble away any money before she ever gets the chance. And we both know Tobirama won’t.”

Tobirama scoffed but didn’t argue with her because they all knew she probably was right.

“What about you?” Hashirama asked. He knew that it was a long shot, and that he probably shouldn’t have pushed such a delicate topic, but he did it anyway and didn’t really care. “You’re absolutely that cool aunt who shows up with a bunch of presents every time you drop by for a visit.”

The terror and shock on Naminé’s face was palpable. Her lips parted and her eyes doubled in size. Hashirama held back a smile and decided to push it a little further because why the hell not? Someone had to ask her. It might as well be him, one of the few people she could never actually be mad at.

“…Or are you planning on running away before I become a father?” He pressed.

His dark eyes flitted to Tobirama, and his brother actually looked impressed at the boldness of his words.

“Whoa,” Naminé said as she feigned a laugh. “First of all, I wasn’t aware that you wanted me to be involved. Second of all, of course I’m the cool aunt that brings presents. What are you, crazy?” Naminé continued, a smile taking over her features. “And third of all, no. I am not moving again before you become a father, Hashirama.”

“Oh really?” He asked as he feigned innocence, careful to keep a wary eye on Tobirama while he listened for her to explain herself.

“Really,” Naminé assured. “I’m locked into a five-year contract with the hospital. So I’m not going anywhere anytime soon.”

“Hm. Interesting,” Hashirama hummed. He took an innocent sip of coffee just as Tobirama cut in.

“And when that contract is up?” Tobirama asked. To anyone who couldn’t read Tobirama as well as Hashirama could, he would have looked disinterested. But Hashirama noticed the way his brother tapped his finger repeatedly on his mug along with the way his eyes narrowed ever so slightly.

Naminé’s eyes met Tobirama’s from across the kitchen island, and Hashirama almost felt like he should have looked away because there was something intimate about the way they were looking at each other.

“Well when that contract is up I’d like to stay at Hidden Leaf Hospital. It’s a level one trauma center—the only one in the city, so I almost have to stay if I don’t want to lose my skills. And besides,” her eyes flitted back down to her coffee. “I moved at the start of my residency, again during my fellowship, again when I became an attending, and again when I moved back here. And that doesn’t include all the apartment hopping I did in between. I’m just really sick of moving, so I’d like to stay when my contract is up.”

Her eyes met Tobirama’s again and Hashirama bit his tongue so his face didn’t burst into a gigantic grin. He wanted to step out and give them some privacy so they could talk about what her words actually meant, but he couldn’t really do that because it would be way too obvious, even for him.

“Well that’s perfect then,” Hashirama said when the silence got to be unbearable. “You can be the cool aunt then.”

Naminé broke her gaze with Tobirama and gave Hashirama an easy smile. Not that professional one she used when she felt nervous. A real one, with smile lines, crows’ feet, and everything in between.

That’s when he noticed it.

That oversized hoodie Naminé was wearing belonged to none other than Tobirama. And the only reason Hashirama even knew that was because his brother lived almost exclusively in work clothes. He was always in a pair of slacks and a button down, and unless it was the weekend, he generally was always in a tie too. That blue hoodie was one of the only casual pieces of clothing his brother ever wore out of the house.

That was… Interesting.

But then again, maybe it wasn’t. Maybe Naminé was just cold and his brother felt a little bad about it and gave her a sweatshirt to either appease her to make her shut up.

But maybe he didn’t. Maybe he was letting her wear it for some other reason.

“Why are you looking at me like that?” Naminé asked as she raised an eyebrow.

“No reason,” Hashirama said as he worked his ass off to hold back a grin.

“Brother,” Tobirama warned. Hashirama turned to Tobirama, knowing that he was probably smirking right about now. “What are you planning?”

He hummed and shrugged in dramatic fashion. If Tobirama didn’t want to tell him what he was getting up to with Naminé then that was his right, but that didn’t mean Hashirama wasn’t going to file that little bit of information away and bring it up at a later time. Because at the end of the day, Tobirama was still his little brother and that meant he was allowed to pick on him in regards to certain subjects.

Who he was sleeping with happened to be one of those subjects.

“Nothing,” Hashirama lied with that shit eating grin still on his face. “Who wants breakfast?

* * *

“Hey, I had a question,” Naminé said as she poked her head in Tobirama’s office. Tobirama looked away from his screen to see Naminé hanging around in the threshold of the doorway and he held back a sigh.

“Okay,” he said.

“I really should get to my condo and do some stuff around there. I was wondering if you would maybe come.”

Tobirama crossed his arms as he mentally weighed all the work he had to do.

“When did you want to go?”

She shrugged. “Maybe tonight or tomorrow morning? I just—I don’t know. I really don’t want to go by myself.”

He didn’t want her to go by herself either.

“We can go when I’m finished here. It’ll probably be another hour,” he said. “Does that work?”

Naminé nodded and pushed herself away from where she leaned against the wall, about to leave. But just before she did, she paused and opened her mouth to say something, and then promptly closed it.

Tobirama raised an eyebrow. “Is there something else?”

“Can I check on your hand?” She asked suddenly. “I want to make sure it’s healing okay.”

Tobirama blinked. He had actually forgotten about the stitches in his knuckles. They hadn’t really hurt that much, and there was just so much going on at work that he hadn’t given them more than a passing thought unless he unknowingly clenched his hand.

He nodded and watched as she came closer, holding out his hand so she could inspect it. Naminé took it in her own hands and inspected his knuckles with trained eyes. Her hands weren’t as soft as someone might have expected. They were dry and cracking in places, probably from her scrubbing them before and after surgery all day. That didn’t bother him though. If anything, it only made him appreciate her work ethic even more.

“This looks really good,” Naminé said as her eyes still focused on the wound. “I should be able to take the sutures out in a few days.”

“I’m not going to have to go to the hospital for that, am I?” He asked, not wanting to take time out of his day for something so minor.

“No,” she told him as she let go of his hand. “It’ll take two seconds. I just cut them and pull them out with some tweezers.”

She gave him an easy smile and his chest felt warm. “Come find me whenever you’re finished. I’ll be downstairs.”

Tobirama nodded and let his eyes linger on her as she walked away.

She was still wearing his sweatshirt and he decided that he still liked the way it looked on her. It was just so endearing, seeing her in an article of his clothing.

That had been the annoying part though. Acknowledging that it was endearing and that he liked seeing her in his clothes.

And hell. If Tobirama thought that his feelings revolving around Naminé Nakano had been confusing when he woke up that morning and was half asleep and really sentimental, then they were a thousand times worse after she told him and Hashirama that she was planning on staying in the area.

That had been the part that really fucked with him because it added a whole new element to the stupid little equation he had been forming in his head.

If she was going to stay in the area, then that made everything all the more serious, and it meant that he would have to be that much more careful.

And kissing her in an exhausted, half asleep state was the _opposite_ of careful.

Christ, what had he been thinking?

The easy answer was that he hadn’t been thinking, and that he was tired and sentimental for whatever reason, and just acted without giving it any thought.

The difficult answer was that he _had_ been thinking and wanted to do it anyway, despite not having thoroughly weighed all the pros and cons.

He decided he liked the easy answer more because it gave him a better excuse for his behavior.

Still though, he’d have to be twice as careful and take a look at things from a new perspective, because what little thought he had given the whole situation, he had done so under the guise of her leaving in a few years. Not under the guise of her staying indefinitely.

He hated how much that little factor weighed so heavily on him, because if he didn’t know any better, he would say that he was starting to lean one way over the other. And he couldn’t do that. Not until he really had a chance to think things through.

Groaning in frustration, Tobirama directed all of his attention to his laptop.

He should have remained celibate for the rest of his life. Things would be so much easier that way.

* * *

“He was following me, all right?” Mikoto snapped as tears pricked the back of her eyes. “Who the hell else would leave that in front of the club other than some freaky ass fanatic?”

Madara sighed and looked at Tsunade, hoping that maybe she would have an explanation for the book that was left outside of Mangekyo Strip Club earlier that day.

“You sure it wasn’t here before we opened?” Tsunade asked with a frown.

“Nina opened,” Madara said straight away. “She would have noticed something weird if it had been.”

“If this shit keeps happening then I’m going to take a leave of absence,” Mikoto snapped again. “I’ve been watching the news, all right? I’ve seen all those weird cult sacrifices and I am not about to let myself become a statistic.”

“Nobody is taking a leave of absence,” Madara said before Mikoto started going off again. “Tell your boyfriend to pick you up for now.”

“Fugaku is a bartender at Kaguya’s. He gets done after me,” Mikoto deadpanned.

“I’ll drive you home tonight and we’ll have Nina do it tomorrow, okay? We’re not going to let anything bad happen to you,” Tsunade assured.

“I mean it, Madara. If this guy keeps showing up then I’m taking a leave of absence or I’m quitting,” Mikoto promised. Her eyes met Madara’s and he scoffed in response.

He didn’t need or like anyone giving him shit.

And leave it to one creepy incident to scare the absolute piss out of one of his most popular dancers.

“I’ll deal with it,” Madara said as he glared. “Tsunade will drive you home and I’ll tell Bee to stick around a little later. No cult freaks are coming around my club tonight, okay?”

Mikoto looked like she wanted to argue with him, but Madara didn’t give her the opportunity. Instead, he made his way to the back of the club to sit down in the little office that he alternated sharing with Tsunade and Nina. He really should have put a bigger one in somewhere, but he didn’t feel like wasting the money on it since hardly anyone but Tsunade consistently used it.

He opened up his laptop and pulled up the security feed and played back the incident Mikoto was referring to, when she left the club last night and some cult guy followed her home.

There wasn’t much to see other than the guy approaching Mikoto, and he had a sweatshirt on with the hood pulled up, so you couldn’t see much other than a brief flash of his face. And the grain from the security camera didn’t help that.

Madara rubbed his chin and narrowed his eyes.

Something about the whole situation didn’t sit right with him, and he didn’t like that. Not one bit.

Something was off, and he was going to find out what.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter gave me SO MUCH fucking trouble and I STILL don't like how it turned out. I literally rewrote this shit six goddamn times. S I X. 
> 
> Ugh lol sorry if this is shit. Lo siento ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯


	17. Chapter 17

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was supposed to go up yesterday, but I was irresponsible and went out drinking and now I'm hungover as fuck and think this chapter is garbage because I was editing while I was hungover as fuck lmao so idk what this shitshow is anymore haha

The last time Tobirama had been in Naminé’s place was after Hidan broke in. He remembered that first time thinking how empty and lonely her condo felt, and this time was no different. If anything, it actually felt worse since she hadn’t been staying there for some time.

She currently was in the basement doing laundry, and Tobirama was on the main floor, very carefully walking around and trying to notice any signs of a breaking and entering.

Thankfully, there were none.

“My poor roses,” Naminé’s voice echoed from another room.

Tobirama walked in the direction of her voice and caught her walking into the kitchen and discarding a bouquet of white roses and rinsing out the vase they were initially in.

“Do you always have flowers in your home?” He asked as he crossed his arms and leaned against the wall, remembering the other weekend when she came back to his place after their fight with a small bouquet of white roses.

“Try to,” she said with a small shrug of her shoulders. “Once I finished my residency and started making real money it was the one thing, I indulged in. I normally get them delivered every week.”

Tobirama looked at her carefully, watching the way she dried her hands and turned around to face him, noticing the way her cheeks immediately reddened when she caught his steady eyes.

“I’m surprised you chose to indulge in flowers and not tequila,” he remarked coolly.

The warm sound of her laughter filled his ears and if he didn’t know any better, he would have sworn his stomach fluttered.

“According to you, I’m too old to indulge in tequila,” she said with a pretty smile.

Tobirama couldn’t help it when he actually cracked a smirk. “That’s because you are.”

She scoffed but there was still a smile on her face, one that reached all the way up to her eyes.

“Listen, it’s not like I have a family or anything. All I have is my work. So, I don’t see a problem if I like to get a little stupid on tequila on my weekends,” she said, her voice light as a feather as she guided them into the living room.

He pursed his lips, his mouth suddenly feeling a little dry.

_‘It’s not like I have a family or anything.’_

She could have. She could have had a family if she had just stayed or if she had just come back sooner.

Tobirama worked his jaw and tried to dispel the rising tension in his gut. It wasn’t worth getting worked up over. Especially when he considered how often he lost his control around the blonde woman. He was better off pretending like he hadn’t heard anything at all.

“Come on. We can watch a movie while we wait for my clothes,” Naminé said as she collapsed onto the sofa, simultaneously grabbing a blanket and draping it over her legs.

“You have horrible taste in movies,” he muttered as he took a seat beside her.

“I do not,” she insisted. “I like the classics.”

“ _The Evil Dead_ is a classic?”

“It’s a cult classic.”

“Apparently every bad horror movie is a cult classic then,” he started, plucking the remote from her hand. “I’ve wasted enough of my life being subjected to your awful movie preferences.”

“Rude,” Naminé said under her breath, though he could see a smile on her face through the corner of his eye.

“Yes, making me watch awful horror movies is rude,” Tobirama said, a little surprised with how _light_ his voice was.

“Tobirama!” Naminé said with a laugh.

He looked over his shoulder and smirked at her, saying a smug, “Naminé.”

“You are the worst. Do you know that?” She said with that smile still glued to her face and lighting up her eyes.

He tried to wipe the smirk off his face but just wasn’t able to. “And you’re insufferable.”

“Guess we’re two peas in a pod then,” she said, reaching across his chest and swiping the remote away from him.

Tobirama scoffed but couldn’t find it in him to be annoyed with her. Not when she was smiling at him like that and not when she looked so endearing still in his sweatshirt.

She pressed her lips together in a poor attempt to hide her grin and settled herself beside him as she scrolled through movies on her TV.

Tobirama’s eyes flickered back over to the screen, watching her go through titles before pausing when she reached _My Bloody Valentine_ , making him roll his eyes and snatch the remote away from her for a second time.

“No,” he said, stretching his arm away when she made a move to steal the device back.

“Stop being so difficult,” Naminé said, gently swatting his arm. “It’s one movie.”

“You’re the difficult one here. You’ve always been the difficult one,” he pointed out.

She snorted and leaned against him to try and seize the remote, all whilst saying a very casual, “it’s not my fault you have a thing for challenging women.”

“I do not…” He trailed off when he realized that he did, in fact, have a thing for challenging women and instead let out a huff. “Enough, Woman. Haven’t I suffered through enough of your disgusting movies?”

She snickered. “You have, but I’m assuming you haven’t watched a real cult classic in nine years. So…” She made another reach for the remote but Tobirama easily held it out of her short reach, making her scowl at him as she hovered over his chest. “We’re about to fight for that because I am not about to sit through one of your deeply thought-provoking movies.”

He scoffed in amusement and said, “a fight would damage your pride too much.”

“Says the most prideful man I have ever met in my entire life,” she shot back.

“You have just as much as pride as I do. If not more,” he said with ease. Naminé always had been prideful, but becoming a surgeon made her almost arrogant.

She halted in her reaching over him for the remote and narrowed her eyes as she inspected his face with laser-like focus. And then without another passing moment, sighed dramatically and leaned back into the soft cushions of the sofa.

“Fine. You win. Go ahead and pick one of your critically acclaimed, thought-provoking, deeply touching, movies.”

She couldn’t have been more dramatic if she tried, but Tobirama didn’t let that bother him. It was a victory and he would take that where he could get it.

Instead of picking one of the movies that Naminé expected, he opted for something else.

“ _Goodfellas_?” She asked.

“Mhm,” he hummed as the movie started.

“Wow I’m impressed,” she said as she pulled the blanket over her legs up to her shoulders. “I actually love this movie.”

“I know,” he said easily.

They settled into a comfortable silence and watched the movie, Naminé only interrupting it once to go downstairs and switch the laundry from the washer to the dryer.

When she came back upstairs, she sat closer to him, her thigh brushing against his. The silence between them was still comfortable and easy, but partway through, Tobirama noticed Naminé knotting her fingers in the blanket draped over her lap.

He raised his eyebrow when he noticed it but didn’t comment on it until she continued to fiddle with the blanket for at least three straight minutes.

“What’s wrong?” Tobirama asked.

“Huh?” Her fingers twisted further into the blanket as she looked over her shoulder at him.

Instead of saying it, he nodded down at her hands and waited for a response.

Her eyes flickered down for a moment, and she hastily released the blanket.

“Sorry, I just feel a little off,” she muttered. “My back is a little sore.”

He narrowed his eyes. “Are you still taking Percocet for it?”

The corner of her lips twitched downward and a crease appeared in her forehead as she said a soft, “please don’t look at me like that.”

“I’m not looking at you like anything,” he said, even though he was fairly certain that he was.

“I’m down to one a day and haven’t had any at all lately,” she said as her eyes fell.

“Mm,” he hummed, disappointment sitting on his chest like a fifty-pound weight, bringing up old feelings he thought he had long since forgotten.

She sighed and ran her hand through her short hair and sat back to get a better look at him. “You don’t believe me.”

He wasn’t sure what came over him, but the words came out before he could stop them, with bitterness, venom, and everything in between.

“Can you blame me? Should a recovering drug addict be taking Percocet at all?”

She flinched, and he hated himself just a little for saying it at all, but it was too late to take the words back, and he wouldn’t even if he could. It was something that needed to be said.

“No. A recovering drug addict should not be taking Percocet,” she drawled, eyes on the floor instead of him.

“Then why are you still taking it?” He asked. “Do you want to relapse?”

“Of course not!” She said right away, finally looking him in the eyes. “Why would you even ask me that?”

“Because you’re playing with fire,” he shot back. “I’m sure that Hidan’s attorney is well aware of your history with substance abuse and will bring that up during the trial. Any half decent attorney would.”

“Would you have a little faith in me?”

He didn’t say anything. He just couldn’t because he knew something awful would come out of his mouth, something bitter and cold—and he didn’t want to upset her and risk undoing all of the progress they made thus far.

So he just kept his mouth shut.

“I know you have something to say. So just say it,” she said, though there was no bite to her words.

“No,” he deadpanned.

“Why?”

“Because I don’t want to fight with you,” he said, avoiding her eyes and looking straight ahead at where _Goodfellas_ was still playing.

“I don’t want to fight either. But this is clearly something that bothers you so—”

He huffed in irritation and shot her a look. “I don’t want to talk about your drug problem, Naminé.”

She didn’t flinch this time, but her eyebrows did knit together, and she started to twist her fingers into the blanket again.

“I don’t have a drug problem.”

He looked at her, _really_ looked at her, and held back the urge to sigh. He couldn’t tell how honest she was being. She looked serious. She kept eye contact, her expression was earnest, and she squared her shoulders back when she said it. She looked like she was telling the truth.

He just wasn’t sure if that was enough for him to believe her, not when he considered everything else.

“I hope you don’t,” he said.

“I’m clean.”

“Are you? _Can_ you be clean if you’re taking Percocet for a back injury that happened over ten years ago?” He blurted.

Naminé blinked at him a few times, as if she wasn’t sure if she heard him correctly or not, and then let out a long sigh.

“Can I ask where this is coming from?”

She could, but he didn’t think he would have an answer for her if she did.

“No,” he said.

“All right,” she mumbled. She leaned back into the couch and returned her attention to the movie, her fingers still tightly weaving in and out of the blanket.

He tried to do the same, focus on the movie instead of the thoughts swimming in his head. He tried to enjoy the classic mob film all while simultaneously pushing away images of Naminé in a white dress with pupil blown eyes, stuttering out an apology.

He couldn’t though, and that pain he thought he had gotten over years ago began to smother him to the point where he had to pinch the bridge of his nose in frustration to try and get a goddamn grip before he gave himself a migraine.

“Tobira—”

“I’m fine,” he said right away.

She cleared her throat and tucked a lock of hair behind her ear.

“Okay.”

* * *

Madara glared so hard at the small screen of his phone that he had half the mind to think he was about to go cross-eyed. Mikoto didn’t come in because there was another story in the news about a cult group attacking another woman in the city and trying to use her as a sort of blood sacrifice.

Similar stories had been popping up for several weeks now, but weird shit was always happening in the city. Sooner or later the cops would catch the freaks and prosecute them, or one woman would wake up with the memory of her attackers and pursue legal action.

And he really needed that to happen sooner rather than later, because if Mikoto didn’t feel safe then his other girls wouldn’t feel safe either. And if his girls didn’t feel safe, then they wouldn’t come in.

A strip club needed strippers.

And it wasn’t like he could ask Nina to fill in one night. She would probably slap him if he even suggested it.

So he was at a temporary loss for now.

All he could do was beef up the security and hope that the cops would catch these freaks sooner rather than later.

* * *

Tobirama stubbornly avoided Naminé the rest of the night, choosing to go straight to his office when they returned to his house and choosing to not come out for the rest of the night. He even let himself pass out at his desk and risk sore shoulders because he just couldn’t look at Naminé with his head in pieces the way it was.

Naminé must have felt the shift in his mood too because she wasn’t around Sunday. All he had was a text from her saying that she had some errands to run and that was it.

So, he got to spend Sunday trying to put his head back together, and he actually was grateful for the time alone.

He needed to sort his thoughts out and needed to get a goddamn grip.

Which incidentally, he didn’t get much of a chance to do because he got distracted with work. And before he knew it, Naminé walked into his office close to six o’clock at night.

“You were out long,” he said nonchalantly when she came into his peripheral vision.

“I was,” she said as she came right up to his desk and sat on the edge of it, effectively pulling any and all attention away from his work.

“Do you need something?” He asked, genuinely confused why she was suddenly interested in striking up a conversation after avoiding him all day.

“Hashirama called and wanted to know where we were,” she said.

He narrowed his eyes. “Why?”

“Family dinner,” she said right away.

_Shit_.

“I forgot,” Tobirama muttered, checking the time on his watch and wondering if Hashirama would forgive him if he didn’t show up.

“I know,” Naminé said with a light laugh. “Come on. The car’s running. I’ll drive.”

He glared but closed his computer and got up.

“You’re a terrible driver.”

“I am not,” she said back.

He scoffed and made a quick stop by the bedroom to grab his wallet and met her downstairs before they headed out.

His head felt clearer after working all day without being interrupted, and he felt much better since he had been so productive. He wasn’t even upset about being stuck in a car with Naminé when his thoughts were still so shambled when it came to her.

And he appreciated that.

The whole ride to Hashirama’s was quiet, and he had a feeling it was because Naminé was trying to gauge his mood, evident from the way her eyes would occasionally drift over to him, but she never broke the silence, not until they were walking up Hashirama’s driveway.

They walked inside without knocking, and the moment they crossed the threshold into Hashirama’s house, Tobirama could hear sounds of laughter coming from the living room.

“It’s about damn time!” Hashirama said with a grin, walking up to Tobirama and patting him on the back while simultaneously slinging an arm around Naminé’s small shoulders. “What were you two doing that took so long?”

Tobirama caught the way Hashirama wiggled his eyebrows suggestively and was overcome with the urge to smack his elder brother upside the head.

“He was working,” Naminé said easily.

“Do you ever stop?” Mito asked, coming up to Tobirama and greeting him with a polite kiss on the cheek.

“That would be a no,” Toka chimed in from where she was on the couch, scrolling through her phone.

“Leave it alone,” Tobirama said with a sigh, already wishing he just stayed at home.

“Naminé, you look a little flushed. You feeling okay?” Mito asked as her eyebrows knit together in concern.

Tobirama looked over his shoulder in confusion. He hadn’t noticed Naminé looking flushed back at the house?

But sure enough, when he got a better look at her in the warm light of Hashirama’s home, she did in fact, looked flushed, and there was a glistening of sweat on her forehead despite the chill outside and despite the fact that she still didn’t have a jacket.

“I’m okay,” she said with a tight smile. “Probably just allergies.”

Tobirama furrowed his brow.

“Do you want water?” Hashirama offered.

“Actually yeah, that’d be great,” she said.

Hashirama nodded and Naminé followed him out of the living room and into the kitchen, leaving Tobirama alone with Mito and Toka.

“Is Tsunade here?” He asked.

“She’ll be here any minute. She said there was a problem at work,” Mito said after she sat down beside Toka on the sofa.

“Everything good?” Toka inquired.

He sighed and plunged his hands into his pockets. “Yes.”

Toka absolutely wasn’t convinced at all because her eyes were boring into him in a way that practically screamed ‘ _I think you’re full of shit._ ’

Moments later, Hashirama and Naminé emerged from the kitchen and Hashirama didn’t look any less concerned then he had a second ago.

Naminé sat down beside Toka and Toka’s eyes narrowed into slits when she looked at her.

“The hell is wrong with you? We have the trial tomorrow,” Toka muttered.

“I’m fine. I just need to sleep it off,” Naminé deflected with a weak smile that wasn’t very convincing.

Before Tobirama could say anything though, Tsunade came in and greeted everyone with a hurried, “sorry I’m late! The girls at the club have been freaking out a little lately and it’s been one hell of a process to get out on time.”

Tsunade patted Tobirama on the shoulder in a greeting, hugged Hashirama and Mito, and paused when she saw Naminé.

“Whoa, you okay?”

“Oh my God, I’m fine!” Naminé said with a tight smile that looked almost painful.

“Hey I’m just asking,” Tsunade then proceeded to hug her and then pat Toka on the shoulder as well. “Did I miss dinner?”

“Nope,” Mito said as she stood up. “It’s ready now. Come on, you can help me put everything out.”

Tsunade huffed but didn’t argue and followed Mito out of the room.

“I still can’t believe that she works for Madara,” Toka said, getting up and hovering to make sure Naminé was fine to get up on her own before they all made their way into the dining room.

“I think it’s good!” Hashirama said right away. “I’m glad he doesn’t totally hate the family.”

“No, I think he might. I think he just makes an exception for Tsunade because she’s a bombshell,” Toka said with a very casual shrug of her shoulders.

“I second that,” Naminé added with a smirk that didn’t reach her eyes.

“ _Or_ ,” Hashirama said with a cheesy grin. “Madara really _has_ come around and he knows that there’s no bad blood between us.”

“I highly doubt that,” Toka said. “But it’s cute you think so.”

Just as Hashirama and Toka rounded the corner into the dining room, Tobirama reached his hand out and rested it on Naminé’s lower back, making her come to a halt.

She blinked at him and raised an eyebrow. “Yeah?”

He could feel how warm she was even through the material of her shirt—which did absolutely nothing to dispel his worries.

“You swear everything is okay?” He asked.

She searched his eyes for a moment and then gave him a small smile as she said, “yeah. Everything’s fine. Don’t worry so much.”

She then pulled away from his touch and headed into the dining room, leaving him standing there to assume the worst.

* * *

Hidan glared at Kakuzu from across the table in the dive bar, already fed up with his attorney after being around him for no more than five minutes.

“Are you an idiot?” Kakuzu snarled. “Going to the hospital and threatening the woman out in the open when her boyfriend is with her? Are you brain damaged? Were you dropped on your head as a child?”

Hidan rolled his eyes. “No one was around. And that was the whole point. I wanted him to punch me. I thought it would help our case.”

“Toka Senju is not an idiot,” Kakuzu practically spat in Hidan’s face as he said it. “She would have been able to spin a story about how it was in self-defense. You’re a complete waste of my time. You couldn’t have just left the doctor alone or at least killed her that first night, could you? You really had to drag this whole thing out?”

Hidan took a long swig of his beer before he answered. “That’s not the way the Jashinists handle our sacrifices.”

Kakuzu actually groaned as if he were about to vomit, which honestly, was possible.

“Right. You prefer breaking into houses, leaving the front door wide open so your victims know you’re inside and don’t come in.”

Hidan snickered, “that was more for fun.”

“I hate you,” Kakuzu deadpanned. “I should have let Kisame take your case.”

“You couldn’t risk getting back at the Senju. You’re still upset about that case with Hashirama,” Hidan said with another snicker.

Kakuzu didn’t dignify that with a response, but he didn’t have to. Hidan already knew. He did his research when he found out who his attorney was going to be.

“Fortunately for you, I have an ace up my sleeve in case you’ve royally fucked your case to hell,” Kakuzu said, knocking back his vodka. “And for the love of God, tell your stupid cult followers to refrain from assaulting random women in the city!”

Kakuzu slammed his glass on the table for extra effect.

“I can’t control them or the way of Jashin,” Hidan said with a scowl.

“You better try. Otherwise, no jury will acquit when they see the connection between your ridiculous religion and these assaults.”

Hidan rolled his eyes but didn’t argue. Kakuzu wouldn’t understand anyway.

“What about the witness? Do you have a plan?” Hidan asked.

That had been the only thing he was concerned about when Kakuzu was prepping him for the trial. He knew Kakuzu would be able to get him out of this and he knew that he could handle any attorney Dr. Nakano hired, but when he heard who her star witness was going to be, he got a little nervous.

“Don’t concern yourself with the witness,” Kakuzu said. “He’s harmless.”

Hidan could have grimaced.

“You told me everything there was to tell about him, yes?” Kakuzu pressed. Hidan nodded before Kakuzu continued. “Then don’t worry about it.”

“Fine.”

“Now go home and go to bed. Don’t assault anyone on your way home, don’t go drinking fucking blood on your way back, and don’t let your little cult followers do any of that shit either! Got it?” Kakuzu warned, shoving his finger in Hidan’s face.

Hidan scoffed. “I do not drink blood.”

“Yeah and I’m a sixteen-year-old girl.” Kakuzu stood up and dropped a five-dollar bill on the table before he gave Hidan a disgusted once over. “I mean it. No weird shit.”

Hidan smirked and held his hands up.

“No weird shit.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short chapter but shit is about to hit the fan so that's fun


	18. Update

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just my rambling thoughts.

After a lot of thought, I’ve decided to put this story on hold—indefinitely.

The simple truth is that I’m really not happy with where this story is right now. I know exactly what needs to happen and how to make it happen, but with the way things are written right now I’m just not enjoying it at all. I’ve even written the next 2 chapters and I straight up hate them both… I’m just really unhappy with the story and have been for a bit.

And that totally bums me out because I did a lot of work on the back end with this one, but it just isn’t turning out how I’d like it to turn out. AND THAT SUCKS BECAUSE I WAS SO PUMPED TO GET TO THE THIRD ACT OF THIS STORY OUT.

Eventually I want to go back and rewrite/condense/rework some parts, but honestly, I don’t know when that is going to happen with the way my schedule is.

It definitely sucks having to post this but I feel it’s better rather than just leaving everyone who was reading this in a state of limbo. Your support has been incredible and you deserve better than that. Everyone’s kind words have unreal and I cannot tell you all how much I appreciate them, but I’m just kinda bleh right now with this story.

Who knows. Maybe this summer I’ll go back and rework the whole thing. I actually did that with my Minato story during one of the many hiatuses and I might do that with this one.

WHO. KNOWS.

But for now, I’m going to leave this here. I’m really sorry for those of you who have been loyally reading this and who have been so amazingly supportive, but these are my thoughts that I’ve been wrestling with since like November.

Next story that goes up will be one I’ve already finished entirely so there will be steady updates again (like there were with the first 14 or so chapters with this story).

Once again, thank you SO much for your support. You all have been incredible. I just hope you all can be understanding with this decision.

Thanks for being so awesome

—Blair xoxo


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